Investigating Arabic: Current Parameters in Analysis and Learning (Studies in Semitic Languages and Linguistics)

INVESTIGATING ARABIC

STUDIES IN SEMITIC LANGUAGES AND LINGUISTICS EDITED BY

T. MURAOKA AND C.H.M. VERSTEEGH

VOLUME XLII INVESTIGATING ARABIC

INVESTIGATING ARABIC Current Parameters in Analysis and Learning EDITED BY

ALAA ELGIBALI

BRILL LEIDEN • BOSTON 2005

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Investigating Arabic : current parameters in analysis and learning / edited by Alaa Elgibali. p. cm. — (Studies in Semitic languages and linguistics, ISSN 0081-8461 ; v. 42) Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index. ISBN 90-04-13792-0 1. Arabic language—Study and teaching—Foreign speakers. 2. Applied linguistics. I. Elgibali, Alaa. II. Studies in Semitic languages and linguistics ; 42. PJ6066.I58 2004 492.7’071—dc22 2004045783

ISSN 0081-8461 ISBN 90 04 13792 0

© Copyright 2005 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill Academic Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910 Danvers , MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands

CONTENTS

Introduction ................................................................................ Alaa Elgibali

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PART I

LANGUAGE ANALYSIS Chapter One Breaking the Rules without Wanting to: Hypercorrection in Middle Arabic Texts ............................ Kees Versteegh

3

Chapter Two Acquisition of Arabic as a Native Language: Implications for Linguistic Analysis ...................................... Alaa Elgibali

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Chapter Three Ali Farghaly

A Case for an Inter-Arabic Grammar ........

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Chapter Four Polysemy in Arabic Dialects .......................... Zeinab Ibrahim

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Chapter Five Weak Verbs in Arabic .................................... Abdellah Chekayri

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Chapter Six Towards a Grammar of Spoken MSA: A Corpus-based Approach .................................................... Sameh Al-Ansary

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contents PART II

LANGUAGE LEARNING Chapter Seven The Grammatical Tradition and Arabic Language Teaching: A View from Here ............................ Jonathan Owens

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Chapter Eight Teaching Arabic Dialectology in European Universities: Why, What, and How .................................... Soha Abboud-Haggar

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Chapter Nine An Error Analysis of Malay Students’ Written Arabic ........................................................................ Adil Elsheikh Abdalla

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Chapter Ten Verbal Report Data and L2 Reading Comprehension: The Case of the Think Aloud Technique .............................................................................. Mahmoud Abdalla

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Chapter Eleven Contrastive Analysis of the Segments of French and Arabic ................................................................ Daniel L. Newman

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Notes on the Contributors ........................................................ Bibliography ................................................................................ Index ..........................................................................................

207 209 221

INTRODUCTION Alaa Elgibali

This book offers a wide range overview of current research issues in Arabic linguistics, extending from the general to the specific. It includes in depth investigations of theoretical and applied topics that are of interest to general linguistics, Arabic linguistics, and learning and teaching Arabic as a first or foreign language. Despite the diversity of the topics, they fall thematically into two major inter-related categories, analysis and learning.

Language Analysis In chapter I, Kees Versteegh discusses the importance of investigating linguistic features exhibited in the production of Middle Arabic by native speakers. He uses the term ‘Middle Arabic’ in the sense outlined by Blau in 1965 to refer to texts that include mixed features from standard and colloquial Arabic varieties, regardless of the text time period. Versteegh examines systematic errors, or deviations from standard Arabic grammar, which appear in native speakers’ writings. He concludes that these errors not only show interference from regional or native dialects but also point out a regular pattern of hypercorrection. The study demonstrates with textual evidence that this pattern of hypercorrection is not a new phenomenon to the Arabic language situation, but extends back in time for many centuries. Versteegh concludes that such sociolinguistic behavior by native speakers reflects the tension between societal attitudes and community expectations which demand the use of certain language features in writing, on the one hand, and the inability of the speakers to perform successfully due to insufficient knowledge of Arabic grammar, on the other. In chapter II, Alaa Elgibali explores the implications of studying the acquisition of Arabic as a first language to the process of formulating grammatical rules that are adequate, general, and cognitively sound. To illustrate, the author examines a number of analytically

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controversial features in Cairene Egyptian Arabic dialect: emphasis, vowel length, and syllable structure. The issues debated are whether emphasis is a segment-bound or suprasegmental feature, whether vowels have corresponding short and long phonemes or are a set of short vowels and a separate phoneme for vowel length, and whether the syllable structures are CV, CVC and CVCC or CV, CVV, CVVC, and CVCC. Working within a framework encompassing language acquisition and typology, the study demonstrates that findings from first language acquisition have implications for linguistic analysis and theory. In all three cases of controversy, the findings gleaned from the acquisition of the Cairene dialect as a first language either guide or confirm the selection of the language analysis that is adequate and general. Furthermore, these findings contribute to the accumulation of data necessary for formulating assumptions about language typology and universals. When hearing about the multiple hierarchical varieties of Arabic, such as classical, modern standard, and dialect, one may wonder about how native speakers of Arabic handle this multiplicity, presuming that each variety has its own specific grammar. In chapter III, Ali Farghaly undertakes the task of answering this question. He argues that these varieties have a common core or an inter-Arabic grammar. Native speakers can handle the range of Arabic varieties because they know this core. Examining classical, modern standard, and one dialect (Egyptian), Farghaly analyzes a number of main features in phonology, morphology and syntax, and demonstrates the existence of this inter-Arabic grammar. He proposes that such a grammar constitutes part of native knowledge of Arabic grammar and represents what is invariant among Arabic varieties. Farghaly attributes to this inter-Arabic grammar the relative stability of Arabic and the mutual intelligibility among its various varieties. Her further points to the importance of his thesis, which focuses on the commonalties rather than the differences, in teaching Arabic as a foreign language and in developing computational grammars of Arabic. In chapter IV, Zeinab Ibrahim also addresses the need for an inter-Arabic analysis of polysemy and its description in the various dialects. She presents an overview of the feature in historical and contemporary contexts and analyzes a set of five expressions and twenty lexical items across the dialects of Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Algeria, and Morocco. Ibrahim illustrates how polysemy and the different semantics assigned by the various dialects cause either

introduction

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gaps or errors in communications among the speakers of these dialects. She attributes the differences in semantic content to historical developments, which led to semantic broadening, narrowing, or transfer. Ibrahim concludes by calling for a comprehensive inter-dialectal study of polysemy. In chapter V, Abdellah Chekayri contributes to the debate about whether weak verbs in Arabic should be structurally analyzed as triliteral or biliteral. He explores similarities between form and semantic function and presents a synthesis of the semantic, morphological and phonological processes that govern the behavior of these verbs. The analysis is equally applicable to Arabic and other Semitic languages in general. Next, Chekayri shows that semantic relations are traditionally missed between lexical forms of triliterals and quadrilaterals and argues that, semantically, the weak verbs are better grouped according to their basic meanings into compounds of two consonants or etymons. Traditionally, lexical representations of weak verbs assume an underlying triliteral structure that has glides which are deleted when they do not appear on the surface. Chekayri, however, shows that prediction of [y] or [w] is contingent upon the application of apaphonic theory, and argues that these verbs should be analyzed as biliterals: The distribution of both glides among the verbs is an apaphonic function of V2 (for defective and hollow verbs, V1 for assimilated verbs), negating the need for a lexical treatment and justifying an analysis of weak verbs as biliterals. Corpus linguistics, having the advantage of relying on a large sample of actual language usage, has contributed significantly to natural language processing over the last four decades. In chapter VI, Sameh Al-Ansari presents a strategy to build an authentic grammar of spoken MSA. The study limits itself to the NP level as a first step to developing an adequate computational grammar of spoken MSA. The strategy proposed by Al-Ansari is based on compiling a representative corpus of spontaneous spoken MSA, in this instance gleaned from the Egyptian media, and then writing a formal computational grammar to analyze its structures automatically. The formal description uses the Affix Grammar over Finite Lattices (AGFL) and incorporates functions and categories to account for the sequences inside the structures as well as the relations that govern them. This strategy, which integrates a detailed description of the Arabic word classes, yields a parsing accuracy exceeding 95%. Al-Ansari reports that parsing results identify recurring trends and common characteristics of

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introduction

spoken MSA structures and usage that would otherwise go undetected: The primary results obtained show that much of the information needed for building spoken Arabic processing systems is missed by traditional Arabic linguistics. He also delineates the practical applications of automatic processing to the teaching and learning of MSA.

Language Learning In chapter VII, Jonathan Owens undertakes the challenging, and rarely addressed, task of investigating the learning and teaching of Arabic in light of the methodological and philosophical underpinnings of traditional Arabic grammatical theory. He argues that while the interest in Arabic for learning and teaching purposes became the primary motivation for grammatical scholarship only during the 4/10th century, it was in the 3/9th century that Sibawaih and AlFarra offered the most comprehensive descriptive studies of Arabic. Owens outlines the development of the Arabic tradition from what he terms the era of “explicatory descriptivism” to that of “categorizing compartmentalization” and delineates the pros and cons of this development. Whereas interest in detailed description became theoretically marginal given the focus on normative grammar, other fields of language study such as pragmatics benefited and flourished due to that shift in focus. Owens maintains that an understanding of the Arabic grammatical tradition is vital to contemporary language learning and teaching not so much as a practical or pedagogical instrument, but as a source of explanation to both the teacher and the learner of how the existing descriptions of Arabic and even the current Arabic language situation itself came about. In chapter VIII, Soha Abboud-Haggar elucidates the goals which philological programs in Spain have set for learning and teaching Arabic dialectology. These programs aim to raise the level of interest in Arabic dialectology and linguistics, and produce proficient dialect users by broadening their students’ scope of Arabic dialects and its literary tradition. Thus, one aspect of studying dialectology in Spain is diachronic and theoretical, involving theories of linguistic development and the history and comparative study of Arabic dialects. The second aspect is synchronic and applied, including the learning of one dialect in addition to classical Arabic. Abboud-Haggar also treats the thorny issue of which variety of Arabic to begin the

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learning process with, the standard or the dialect. She argues that it is more productive to learn the standard first and then one of the dialects. In chapter IX, Adil Elsheikh Abdalla reports on his study of the systematic grammatical mistakes made by Malay students in writing Arabic, a rare error analysis study that looks at the acquisition of Arabic as a second or foreign language by learners whose native language is not English or French. Abdalla notes that the two salient areas of errors are in using the definite article and prepositions. The study identifies a number of possible sources of errors; namely, interference from Bahasa Melayu (the Malaysian language), false cognates through Arabic loan words in Bahasa Melayu, features inherent in Arabic, flawed analogy, overgeneralization, learners’ incomplete knowledge of rules, and inadequate exposure to Arabic. This study paves the road for further studies in South East Asia, where Arabic continues to attract many students for a variety of reasons; it also has significant implications for suggested teaching practices to enhance the acquisition of Arabic there. In chapter X, Mahmoud Abdalla reports on an empirical study examining the role played by the cultural background of the nonnative reader in the reading comprehension of Arabic texts. The Subjects in the experiment belong to two distinctly different cultural backgrounds, Chinese and American. Each group is tasked with reading an Arabic text that is related to their own culture. The study uses the think-aloud technique as a tool to detect idea units recalled by the readers. Abdalla argues that the results confirm the hypothesis that cultural familiarity enhances the students’ recall of more information, improves their ability to predict accurately the content of foreign language texts, and augments their comprehension of those texts. In chapter XI, Daniel Newman presents the results of a contrastive acoustic study of the phonetic inventory of French and Arabic. The data for Arabic include an example of Qur anic recitation, a reading aloud of a standard Arabic text, and a list of one hundred isolated words. For French, the data include reading aloud a set of isolated words. Newman outlines the main areas of difference between the two sound systems; namely, Arabic pharyngeals and French rounded and nasal vowels. He concludes by arguing that these areas of differences will lead to negative transfer in each case consistent with Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis.

PART I

LANGUAGE ANALYSIS

CHAPTER ONE

BREAKING THE RULES WITHOUT WANTING TO: HYPERCORRECTION IN MIDDLE ARABIC TEXTS Kees Versteegh

1. Introduction All teachers of Arabic are familiar with the kind of mistakes native speakers of Arabic make when writing Standard Arabic. Thus we find wrong expressions like tuiadu fi l-Gurfati xizanatan, ‘There is a closet in the room’, ra aytu yalayata a ara bintan, ‘I saw thirteen girls’, and inna-hum lam yaktubuna wagibata-hum, ‘They have not done their homework’. Such mistakes are deeply deplored by teachers although they never seem to be able to root them out completely. As a matter of fact, some of these mistakes, especially those connected with the spelling of the hamza and the construction of the numerals, figure prominently in style books such as the one of the newspaper al- ahram. The point I wish to make in this paper is that errors like these, deplorable though they may be from the point of view of the teacher and the purist, highlight for us the rules of the standard language. Moreover, the distribution pattern of the mistakes informs us about their hierarchy and the linguistic attitude of the speech community towards them. The linguistic mistakes also tell us something about the source of interference. In some cases it is obvious that this source is the vernacular language of the speakers, which affects their production of Standard Arabic. Such deviations from standard grammar result in forms that belong to the structure of the vernacular language. For instance, when a native speaker of Egyptian Arabic writes inna-hum yaktubu ‘they are writing’, there is an unmistakable interference from the vernacular form humma yiktibu, without the Standard Arabic ending -na. In other cases, however, the source of the mistakes is not immediately obvious, as in the sentence quoted above,

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inna-hum lam yaktubuna ‘they did not write’. Here, the vernacular of the author cannot have provided the source, the only explanation being that this is a case of hypercorrection, a mistake caused by the wish to speak too correctly. Sometimes, hypercorrection is distinguished from hypocorrection (Blau 1988: 306–310). Hypercorrections are then defined as standard forms that are applied incorrectly, while hypocorrections are half-way correct, in other words forms that do not occur neither in the dialect nor in the standard language.

2. The Term ‘Middle Arabic’ The general name for texts containing deviations from the standard grammar is Middle Arabic, a term which has given rise to a number of conceptual problems. The term ‘Middle Arabic’ should not be regarded as denoting a period in the history of the language as in the case of the term ‘Middle English’, which denotes the variety of the language between the periods of Old English and Modern English. Nor should Middle Arabic be conceived of as a sociolinguistic term. It is true that the Arabic equivalent al-lu a al-wus a is often used to denote the variety of the language also known as lu at almuyaqqafin, the ‘mixed’ language used in speaking by intellectuals (cf. Badawi 1973). But this denotes a different phenomenon, a level of speech in its own right that is acceptable among intellectuals and that decidedly never contains the kinds of hypercorrections mentioned above. In fact, Middle Arabic has sometimes been used as the name for a special variety of the language, often connected with a certain period in time. Blau, for instance, at first applied the term ‘Middle Arabic’ to what he saw as a language variety, “the linguistic result of the great Arab conquests during the seventh century A.D.” (1965: 1) and a language that “already clearly exhibits all the structural peculiarities that caracterize modern Arabic dialects” (1965: 3). Later, however, he conceded that such a definition does not work with the kind of texts that are normally regarded as examples of Middle Arabic because of their extreme variability, both in time and distribution, and in linguistic features. Besides, the deviations from the rule are not only vernacular elements but also hypercorrections, failed efforts to use the correct standard form in the correct place.

hypercorrection in middle arabic texts

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In a later publication Blau (1982) therefore switched to a new terminology. He noted that the term ‘Middle Arabic’ is used in the literature to denote two very different phenomena, on the one hand the texts that contain a mixture of standard (Classical or Old Arabic) and vernacular (New Arabic) elements, on the other the early forms of New Arabic as they are found in such texts. He therefore proposed to reserve the term ‘Middle Arabic’ for the mixed texts themselves (1982: 96): Daher ist es erwünscht, nur die aus klassisch-arabischen und frühneuarabischen Elementen zusammengesetzte Sprache als Mittelarabisch zu bezeichnen, in Bezug auf die neuarabischen Elemente selbst aber den Ausdruck “Frühneuarabisch” zu benutzen [Therefore, it is preferable to reserve the term of Middle Arabic for the language [of the texts] that is a composite of Classical Arabic and Early New Arabic; with regard to the New Arabic elements themselves, the expression ‘Early New Arabic’ should be used]

In this new framework, Middle Arabic no longer denotes a discrete variety of the language, but a category of texts containing deviations from standard grammar, from whatever period and for whatever reason. In this framework, which I have adopted for this paper, the period of Middle Arabic texts stretches from the earliest beginnings of Arabic prose to the modern time: in contemporary Arab countries, too, people write ‘Arabic with mistakes’. In fact, the main common feature of all these texts is the fact that their writers aim at a model which they are unable to attain, resulting in deviations from the rules that do not belong to any discrete variety of the language (for a discussion of the terminological development see Hary 1989; Versteegh 2001: 114–129; Larcher 2001).

3. Standard and Norms Breaking the rules presupposes a standard form against which the mistakes can be weighed. There has been some discussion in the literature about whether or not such a standard existed from the earliest beginnings of Arabic prose onwards. It is true that the earliest grammatical texts, in which the language was codified, date from the end of the 2nd century of the Hijra. The language of the Egyptian papyri, the oldest of which date from the first century of the Hijra,

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provide us however with some evidence about the existence of a norm at an earlier period. There we find clear cases of hypercorrection that demonstrate the wish of the authors—presumably scribes with insufficient knowledge of the language—to adhere to a certain norm. Deviations from the rules in themselves are not enough to show the existence of a model since they could be regarded as vernacular features that somehow found their way into the written language and were weeded out by subsequent efforts of the grammarians. The hypercorrections, however, cannot be explained in this way and must be regarded as evidence of an existing model or target. The clearest examples of these hypercorrections in the papyri are those where the verbal ending -una/-ina is used after lam or an, e.g., lam tasirina ‘you did not go’ (4th century, Hopkins 1984: 136) or ala an tu adduna ‘on condition that you pay’ (339 A.H., Hopkins ib.). This contrasts with the normal use of -u for the indicative in accordance with the vernacular structure, which in the papyri seems to be the normal form for the plural. Analogously, the usual dual form ends in -a, without the Classical ending -ni. The most extreme case of the hypercorrect use of the Classical ending is one instance in which the ending -una is used with an imperative (1st half 2nd century A.H., Hopkins 1984: 70). An equally remarkable set of examples concerns the use of the accusative ending, as in wa-lahuma yulyayni min arD az-zar ‘the two of them have two thirds of the arable land’ (2nd/3rd century, Hopkins 1984: 100) in the subject position, fa-ra yu-ka fi ¶alika muybatan ‘and your opinion about that is irreversible’ (before 314 A.H., Hopkins 1984: 168) or fainni ilayhi mu tagan ‘for I need it’ (2nd century A.H., Hopkins 1984: 168) in the predicate position, and yulyu dinaran ‘a third of a dinar’ (249 A.H., Hopkins 1984: 171). In the last three cases the accusative endings may be called hypercorrect under the assumption that the accusative ending had disappeared from the vernacular language and was reinstated here in an effort to make the language sound more grammatical. In the first example yulyayni could of course be regarded as a vernacular feature since in the dual—as far as it survived in the dialects—the oblique ending is the one that is used throughout. But here conversely a case like sana iynani i rina wa-mi a ‘the year 122’ (Hopkins 1984: 113) shows the working of hypercorrection by the use of the nominative. Likewise, we find the nominative ending being used in the sound plural in

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wakil ha ula i l- arba nisa al-musammuna fi ha¶a l-kitab ‘the agent of the four women mentioned in the list’ (3rd century A.H., Hopkins 1984: 92). An extreme case is that of the isolated example lam baqa ‘he did not stay’, which occurs in a papyrus dated 208 A.H. According to Hopkins (1984: 153), this example shows that the negation lam had not yet disappeared from vernacular speech, but it seems more likely that it represents another instance of hypercorrection, albeit a horrendous one. In this view, the negation lam had disappeared from spoken speech at an early date and had become a marker of the Classical language. In this case, the scribe used this negation in an effort to write Classical Arabic without being aware of the correct construction of the negation. All of these examples concern hypercorrections that cannot be explained by interference from vernacular speech, which is why they must be regarded as evidence of the existence of a standard norm. It is true that early examples are very rare. There are two explanations for this. In the first place, it may simply be a result of the lack of papyri dating from the very first period of Arab rule in Egypt. In the second place, the reason may well be that in the early period the number of scribes was still extremely low, and the majority of them were probably well-trained, better trained at least than in the later period when the number of semi-literates must have risen. Paradoxically enough, the more people acquire some degree of education, the larger the number of semi-literates and the larger the number of literates, the higher the frequency of mistakes in papyri.

4. Categories of Errors We have seen above that these deviations may be caused by a variety of reasons. The most obvious reason for such mistakes is obviously the lack of sufficient knowledge of standard grammar. All of the above examples in the papyri are probably to be explained in this way. In other categories of texts, we find similar instances, for example in non-literary texts such as treatises on medicine, or in the many collections of folk stories. In the Story of the Doctor and the Cook, which was edited by Nöldeke (1891) and may have originated in the 15th century CE, we find for instance the following description of Baghdad:

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chapter one wa- ala ha¶a l-ba r sab a gasura wa-ha¶ihi l-gasura marakib murabbat n fi ba ihim al-ba wa-tam i n-nas alayhim li-yaqduna a alahum ‘and across this river there are seven bridges and these bridges consist of ships that have been tied together, and the people walk across them in order to go about their affairs (Nöldeke 1891: 14.6–7)

The target language of this passage is obviously the standard language just as it is in the entire story. Yet, it is obvious that the writer has a problem with the agreement rules of Classical Arabic and with the distinction between the verbal moods. Elsewhere, forms such as i¶a daxalu n-nas ‘when the people came in’ (15.19) and qawi asfar ‘very yellow’ (14.18) show the interference of the vernacular language in this text. The numerous mistakes involving the omission or wrong use of the accusative alif may either represent spelling mistakes or genuine efforts at using the standard accusative ending. In the canonical collection of the Arabian Nights scores of such mistakes occur. But more pertinent in such collections are the numerous examples of hypercorrections which prove that for the writers or the scribes the standard language remained the target, even in these folksy tales. From the list given by Wehr (1956: xv–xix) in the introduction to his edition of one such collection, the Kitab al-Hikayat al- agiba wa-l- xbar al-Gariba, I quote the following examples: complete confusion between indicative and subjunctive moods of the verb ( li-yaqtulunani ‘in order to kill me’, also in an imperative form ta ammaluna ‘look!’), the use of the accusative in subject and predicate position and even sometimes after prepositions (e.g., 87.19 fa-wa alna ila maglisan mam-luwwan gawharan wa-¶ahaban ‘and we came to a room filled with jewels and gold’), the use of nunation with diptotic nouns (e.g. dananiran ‘dinars’ or ga iban wa- ara iban ‘wonders and marvels’), and the incorrect use of negations such as that of lam with the prohibitive ( way aka lam takun fu uli ‘woe to you, don’t be so nosy!’, 187.9). It goes without saying that these features representing hypercorrection are accompanied by a host of others that are directly related to the vernacular. Yet, not all deviations in popular literature originate in an insufficient knowledge of grammar. In some stories the use of vernacular language is a stylistic phenomenon, aimed at the titillation of the audience, when for instance a caliph or a vizier is portrayed as using the

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language of the people. Some examples from the story of Basim the Blacksmith, edited by Landberg (1888), may illustrate this. The story starts off at a quite elevated level when the caliph says

fi zam n xilafa harun ar-ra id kana l-xalifa ¶at yawm min al- ayyam Daqa Sadruhu fa-stad a bi-l-waz r ga far wa-qala lahu ya wazir Sadri dayyiq waza lan fi ha¶a l-yawm muradi atabaddal ana wa- anta wa-masr r sayyaf annaqma wa-nasuqqu fi Ba dad natafarrag ala awari ba dad wa- aswaqiha wa-nanÎur a wal ar-ra iyya In the time of the caliphate of Harun ar-Rasid one day the caliph’s heart was oppressed. He called for the vizier and told him Oh vizier, my heart is oppressed and sick, today it is my wish to put on a disguise together with you and Masrur the court executioner and to roam Bagdad to look at its streets and markets and observe the situation of my subjects (Landberg 1888: 2.7–11)

In this passage the norm is still the standard language, as is obvious from expressions such as dat yawm and the use of the conjunction fa-. The story telller even goes to the length of replacing the vernacular expression biddi ‘I want’ with the more Classical muradi (while retaining the asyndetic construction). But when the story develops the protagonists soon start to use a quite different level of speech, in the following passage in which the vizier complains about the bad weather since he wants the caliph to go home (Landberg 3.15–17):

fa-qala Ga far: ya malik az-zaman al-layla di atiya qawi wa-barduha zayid qala lahu min ayna arafta anna d-dunya atiya qala min kutr as-sihab wa-lbard illi Gadda di l-waqt Then Ga far said: O King of the Time this night looks like rain and it is becoming colder. He said to him: How do you know that it is going to rain. He said: Because of the many clouds and because of the cold that has become very intensive now.

Obviously, the story-teller was quite aware of the Egyptianisms he introduced in his story, which he uses as an element of couleur locale for the benefit of the audience, who must have been quite amused when they heard familiar phrases such as mani gi an ‘I am not hungry’ (Landberg 3.8) or uft ya

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amir al-mu minin aho nizil matar alena’ look, o Commander of the Believers, it is raining upon us’ (Landberg 4.4), or xallik ma i idil ‘keep walking straight ahead’ (Landberg 4.13) in the mouth of such important persons as a caliph and his vizier. It may be added that there is a second version of the story in which the Egyptian atmosphere is replaced by a Syrian one and the colloquial expressions used are taken from the Syrian dialect accordingly. Needless to say that mistakes may also occur on account of a combination of both factors. Even when vernacular language is used as a stylistic artifice, the writer (or storyteller) may betray his insufficient command of the standard language by using features that are not identical with the vernacular but arise as hypercorrections. A stylistic example could be the one in the introductory phrase quoted above fi ¶at yawm min al- ayyam ‘once upon a time’, which is clearly a contamination between ¶ata yawmin and fi yawmin min al- ayyam. Likewise, when Masrur says muradi annaka anta taqul lahu ‘I want you to tell him’ (Landberg 2.17f.), using —incorrectly—a Classical conjunction, or when the storyteller says fa-la xaragu Hatta . . . ‘and they hadn’t come out yet when . . .’ with the Classical negation la combined with a perfect verb. These and similar examples show how even in such stories the standard language remains the target of the writer, which may result in the usual pseudocorrections.

5. Middle Arabic as an In-group Language In general one may say that the Middle Arabic texts reflect the attitude of the speech community towards the standard: some mistakes are apparently regarded as worse than others and consequently they appear far less frequently in the texts. This attitude can change over the centuries. An expression like es ‘what?’, which had originally been taboo, is even found in a grammatical text, al- Astarabadi’s (d. ca. 700/1300) Sarh al-Kafiya. In non-Muslim communities in the Islamic empire the attitude towards the linguistic norms differed from that in Muslim circles. For non-Muslims and Muslims alike the Classical Arabic language was and remained the standard for written speech production, but obviously non-Muslims lacked the religious connotations of the standard language as the language of the Qur an and religion in general. It is, therefore, no surprise that in

hypercorrection in middle arabic texts

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Christian and Jewish Middle Arabic texts we find a far larger tolerance for deviations from the standard rules than in Muslim Middle Arabic texts. One might even go so far and maintain that in these communities the use of a different variety of the written language gradually became an in-group symbol. Even those who were perfectly able to write flawless Arabic, did not hesitate to use deviating forms in their correspondence with co-religionists. Thus, for instance, we know that the famous Jewish philosopher Maimonides was able to write faultless Arabic because in his treatises on philosophy, which were addressed at a general audience including Muslims there are no deviations from Classical grammar. But when he writes in reply to questions from other Jews, he does not hesitate to use a much more vulgar style (Blau 1965: 25f.). The in-group character of the Jewish and Christian Middle Arabic texts was strengthened by the fact that very often these were written in different scripts than Muslim Arabic texts. Thus, for instance, Christian texts often used the Syriac script (this category of texts is called Kharsuni), whereas Jewish texts are very often written in Hebrew script. Together with the change in script comes a large amount of loanwords from Syriac and Hebrew, which supported the different character of these texts. Because of the in-group character they seem to be less variable than the texts we have discussed above: certain features seem to have become characteristic of this type of Arabic and are bound to appear in it almost regularly. Nevertheless, even in these varieties the influence of the standard language was always there, as the many examples of hypercorrections from Jewish and Christian texts show. For Judaeo-Arabic one could mention the use of (incorrect) conjunctions after modal verbs, where the dialect construction would be asyndetic, e.g., (Blau 1965: 86) yagibu ala l- insan annahu yu sinu Îannahu bi-xaliqihi ‘a man should think well of his creator’, the profusion of the conjunction fa-, which had disappeared from the dialect and almost become a Classical marker (Blau 1965: 95), the use of alladi as an indeclinable relative pronoun in order to avoid the vulgar form illi (Blau 1965: 53), and the hypercorrect use of verbal forms in -un in subjunctive and apocopate functions (Blau 1965: 63f.). With regard to the latter Blau points out that in Judaeo-Arabic texts from Iraq the situation is the inverse. Just as in the modern Iraqi dialects it is the form with -un that represents the vernacular; consequently, the

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form without -un must be regarded as hypercorrect when it is used in the indicative function. In a few cases Judaeo-Arabic texts written in Hebrew characters are vocalised, which is a precious source of information, in particular about the case endings. In a text from the Cairo Geniza dated from the 12th/13th century CE (edited by Hopkins and Blau in Blau 1988: 195–254) some of the case endings are indicated, but in most instances the wrong vowel is used, often the accusative, e.g., min yiyabana ‘from our clothes’ (Blau 1988: 469), nu ibbakum ‘we love you’ (ib.) and man yu iqani ‘who will hinder me?’ (ib.). The most important conclusion from this incorrect use of the accusative is that the writers apparently felt the need in writing Arabic, even when it was written in Hebrew script, to add declensional markers. The fact that they chose the wrong vowel indicates, however, that their knowledge of Classical grammar was not up to the task. In Christian Arabic a number of hypercorrect examples may be quoted from the Arabic translation of the Book of Ruth edited by Bengtsson (1995) from manuscripts dating from between the 13th and the 17th centuries CE, among them a very telling one in which the ending -an is used in subject position with another verb than kana: fa-xaraga ragulan min bayt Li am ‘then a man went out from Bethlehem’ (Bengtsson 1995: 148). In this Bible translation the cribe has sometimes added vowels to the verbal moods, apparently in order to show his grammatical expertise, but unfortunately thereby revealing his lack of knowledge, e.g., yagibu alayya an uqimu [with damma] l-miray ‘I must resurrect the heritage’ (Bengtsson 1995: 140), and conversely . . . faqalat . . . inni antaliqa [with fatha] ‘then she said . . . I shall go’ (ib.). In the Arabic biography of Saint Menas edited by Jaritz (1993) from manuscripts the majority of which stem from the 17th/18th centuries CE, the following examples occur: lam yu ibuhu ‘he didn’t answer him’ ( Jaritz 1993: 72) and lam Îaharu ‘they didn’t appear’ ( Jaritz 1993: 76). A special feature in this text is the complete confusion between ha¶a and ha¶ihi, both demonstratives from the standard language ( Jaritz 1993: 71). In all of these examples it is obvious that the rules of the standard language continued to play a dominant role in the composition of prose texts, even when these were written in the Jewish or Christian communities. A curious case is that of a few Christian Middle Arabic texts from Egypt that were written in Coptic script. The best-known of these

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texts is the vita of Saint Pachomius that was edited by Casanova (1902; cf. the discussion of Arabic texts in Coptic characters in Blau 1988: 145–193). This Arabic text presumably originated as early as the 13th century CE, but it may go back to a Coptic original from an earlier date, probably around the year 1000 CE. The text is written in standard Arabic but it contains some obvious deviations from standard grammar, such as Dayaqu l- afkar al- ax ‘the thoughts troubled the monk’ with vernacular agreement and Classical word order, and a very interesting example of an asyndetic combination of two verbs wa-lamma qamu amilu S-Salat atlaqa l- ax li-yastari a ‘and when they then performed the prayer, he sent the brother away to get some rest’ (on this construction see Versteegh 1984: 101–103, where it is compared with so-called serial verbs; the editor has obviously misunderstood this passage, since he translates “et lorsqu’ils se levèrent, il[s] lirent la prière commune, il congédia le frère pour qu’il se reposât”). In passing, it may be mentioned that the text is one of the very few examples of transliterated Arabic in a foreign script in which the vowels are indicated. In this way we get some insight in the pronunciation of the vowels (the text was probably transmitted orally and dictated to a scribe). On the one hand, this transliteration shows us that the long vowel a is pronounced with strong imala, for instance the spelling kenet for kanat, on the other, that the case endings are usually not pronounced.

6. The Use of Markers As we have seen above the nature of mistakes may vary across the centuries: what one generation abhors may appear quite harmless to another. Likewise, some linguistic features are deemed characteristic of a certain speech level and are used as markers to indicate the level the writer (or speaker) wishes to aim at. In the case of spoken Arabic, this is of course a common phenomenon (cf. Palva 1969): in certain situations speakers feel compelled to increase the ‘standard’ character of their speech by inserting features such as the occasional passive form, the coordinating particle fa-, as well as typically standard lexical items ( ayDan, etc.). But the opposite phenomenon also occurs, when speakers or writers wish to make their text sound vernacular, in order to decrease the distance with the audience. In

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such cases the occurrence of Classical features shows that in spite of this aim te target remains the standard language. Two examples may be quoted here. In the transcript of a radio programme aimed at housewives (Diem 1984: 71) the speaker apparently uses a written text on which she improvises a dialect realization. This results in sentences such as il-katib bi ul fi ha¶ihi d-dirasa anna l-mar a mumkin tukun ax iyya la tunsa i¶a taga ragul ila Su batiha ‘the writer says in this article that a woman can become an unforgettable personality if there is a man who needs her company’. Here, dialectal expressions (e.g., the asyndetic construction with mumkin) are superimposed on a clearly standard structure (e.g., the conditional sentence at the end). The standard source of the text is demonstrated without any doubt by the use of lexical items such as ay an likewise’, and by the use of several passive forms. But the clearest evidence comes from a number of dialectal hypercorrections such as id-dirasa kanit bi-tatanawal ‘the article discusses’ and lazim kullina bniftikir ‘we all have to reflect’, the former with a hybrid morphological structure, the latter with an imperfect with bi-, which is obviously incorrect after a modal expression but serves to underline the speaker’s wish to focus on the dialect. A second example is that of the brochure literature on various aspects of Dutch society which the Dutch government distributes among Moroccan immigrants in the Netherlands. These brochures have been translated from Dutch into Arabic by Moroccan translators, who feel that they have to use the Moroccan dialect in order to make themselves understood by Moroccan immigrants. From one such brochure, on educational policies, I quote the following phrase kama ta rifuna inna l- agnabi ka-yitlaqqi kayir a - u ubat wat-ta ayyurat fi l- ayat dyal [sic!] wa-bi-l-xu u ma a l- awlad illi ka-yim iw li-l-madrasa ‘as you know, foreigners are confronted with a lot of difficulties and changes in their life, especially with regard to their children who go to school’. The interesting thing is that even though the translator of the brochure has tried to make the sentence sound Moroccan (ka-, illi ), he cannot escape the Classical Arabic model ( kama ta rifuna kayir a - u ubat, bi-l-xu u ). These examples show how difficult it is in the present socio-cultural situation to write in dialect. This applies even to literature in a coun-

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try such as Egypt where people are proud of their dialect and of those writers who use the dialect (cf. Diem 1974: 96–125). But in an analysis of a popular play by Sa d ad-Din Wahba, il-waz r al it-tallaga, which is widely regarded as a good example of dialect literature, it turns out that the structure of the language used is certainly not the common vernacular as it is spoken in Cairo. Thus, for instance, the percentage of possessive constructions with bita is far lower than one would expect from a pure dialect text: in a sample of the text there are 53 synthetic genitives as against 3 constructions with bita in noun/noun combinations; in noun/pronoun combinations these numbers are 104 as against 8 (Malina 1987: 46). Such a constraint against the use of the genitive exponent bita is not an isolated phenomenon: it has been operative throughout the history of the Middle Arabic texts. Blau (1965: 82) notes that even in Judaeo-Arabic texts mata /bita is extremely rare (e.g., al-bayt mata alyetamim ‘the house of the orphans’, where yetamim is a Hebrew loanword). Somewhat more frequent is the genitive exponent alladi li(cf. present-day Moroccan dyal ), presumably because it looks less vernacular and more Classical, e.g., kam muddat al- ayyam alla¶i li- - afa a ‘how long is the period of pre-emption’.

7. The Evidence of Middle Arabic for Historical Linguistics The extreme variability of Middle Arabic texts, both intratextual and intertextual, synchronically as well as over time, entails the impossibility of their use for chronological purposes. Since there are no constraints on co-occurrence as in spoken code-switching, the possibilities for variation are endless: in ordinary spoken speech it would be very marked to say something like il-katib bi ul fi ha¶ihi d-dirasa and one would expect a speaker to stay at the same level at least for a certain stretch of speech. But in written texts it is quite common to find ‘incorrect’ and ‘correct’ variants side by side. A writer who uses feminine singular agreement for non-human plurals in one line, may very well switch to the vernacular construction of plural agreement for non-humans in the next. This means that the variation in the texts depends both on the characteristics of the writer and the attitude towards the standard language in the speech community, rather than on any development

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in the language. In the linguistic literature the Middle Arabic texts have often been adduced as evidence of the development of Arabic. There is indeed an apparent increase of vernacular features over the centuries creating the impression of a gradually developing language. But there are two problems with this reasoning. In the first place, as we have seen above, texts from an earlier period may very well exhibit more vernacular features than a later text. In the second place, even more importantly, the deviations in the texts do not reflect the vernacular language as such but the attitude in the community towards the use of such vernacular features. As a flagrant example we may mention that of the bi- imperfect which is almost absent from written texts until the 20th century. But it does appear frequently on the subscripts of Coptic icons in the Cairene churches that date from the 18th and 19th century. Apparently, the Copts did not feel the same aversion against the use of this form as the Muslims did. If we had no other evidence than the Muslim texts we would be tempted to believe that the bi- imperfect is a late form that did not develop in the vernacular until many centuries after the arabization of Egypt. Fortunately, there are some older sources that give us the bi- forms, for instance the collection of stories edited by Wehr (1956: xvii) in which there are several examples. Even in the Arabic translation of the Book of Ruth, in a manuscript dating from 1690, there is one example of such an imperfect (Bengtsson 1995: 130). In Judaeo-Arabic texts bi- imperfects appear far less than might have been expected; according to Blau (1965: 121f.) the first examples date from the 12th century CE, but they never became very popular. One reason might be that in writing the verbal form with prefixed bi- does not look very Classical. Likewise, in written texts from the Maghreb one finds many more occurrences of the dialectal first person singular of the imperfect verb (nktb) than of the first person plural (ntkbw), presumably because the scriptural image of the former is less shocking than that of the latter. In spite of their scriptural image, we do find bi-imperfects in Muslim Middle Arabic texts. In the manuscripts of a text by the Egyptian scholar Ali ibn Sudun (d. 868/1464), edited by Vrolijk (1998) there are seven occurrences of this form (Vrolijk 1998: 155f.). The editor compares this with the much larger number of occurrences in a somewhat later text, the 17th century hazz al-

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qu uf by a - irbini, edited by Davies (1981; for a comparative analysis of all Egyptian dialect sources from this period see Doss 1995). Interestingly, even in this purportedly dialectal text the majority of the imperfects appears without the aspectual particle, and many other dialectal features such as bita do not appear at all, whereas some Classical features do, such as the demonstratives ha¶a and ¶ak (always spelled with an interdental) alongside vernacular di (Vrolijk 1998: 151), the relative pronoun alla¶i, which is indeclinable and used for both masculine and feminine (Vrolijk 1998: 153), and the use of pattern IV for causative verbs (Vrolijk 1998: 14). In other words, even those texts that are commonly regarded as sources for the contemporary dialects, are affected by interference from the standard language, which remained the natural variety for writing. This is not to say that the Middle Arabic texts do not provide any evidence at all. Of course, they can be used as a terminus ante quem for the chronology of the language. When we find a persistent confusion between the two graphemes a and Îa , we may reasonably assume that this originated in the vernacular as the result of the merger of the phonemes represented by these graphemes. We know indeed that the spelling of these two phonemes was a constant source of concern for the purists among the grammarians. As a matter of fact, the treatises on the la n al- amma mention this mistake as one of the most common errors in writing, and there were even special treatises dedicated to just this error. In such cases, the Middle Arabic texts document the change in the vernacular, but after the fact: once the two phonemes had merged in the vernacular, the spelling in the standard language became a problem for those speakers who no longer had this distinction in their speech. Likewise, a morphological development in the Arabic dialects such as the loss of the -na ending in the imperfect plural verb and the concomitant loss of the modal distinction between indicative on the one hand and subjunctive and apocopate on the other is clearly reflected in the tendency in the texts to use the form yaktubu for all three moods. Even more so, this example illustrates the force of the phenomenon of hypercorrection as in the forms cited above from the papyri where the scribes use lam yaktubuna as a result of their avoidance of the form without -na. In conclusion we may say that the richness of the thousands of Middle Arabic texts has hardly begun to be explored. The information

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contained in these documents may help us to unravel the history of the Arabic language, provided we do not regard them as true reflections of the vernacular speech of the writers, but as ‘the tip of the iceberg’ giving us a glimpse of what had taken place in the spoken speech.

CHAPTER TWO

ACQUISITION OF ARABIC AS A NATIVE LANGUAGE: IMPLICATIONS FOR LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS Alaa Elgibali

I. Introduction All grammars aim to formulate rules that are adequate, general, and, to the extent possible, linguistically elegant. Traditional grammars are typically considered satisfactory when and if they achieve adequacy and generality. Grammars conceived in the framework of some modern linguistic theory, e.g. speech production theories, go one step further and aspire to formulate grammatical rules that not only meet those criteria, but also reflect or approximate cognitive processes. This is the case because one goal of these theories is to identify the core of grammatical principles that is common to all languages. Substantiation for the supposition that there is such a core of principles comes from two domains of linguistics: Language acquisition and language typology. Set in the context of both domains, this paper attempts to show that findings from studying the acquisition of Arabic as a native language may have implications for linguistic analysis. First, they can corroborate our selection between competing grammatical descriptions, for if we find that one description matches processes discerned from first language acquisition while others do not, we can adopt that description based on its cognitive relevance. Second, these findings, being based on discerning actual cognitive data, fit immediately and naturally with the psycholinguistic framework of speech production modern theory, thereby rendering our “adequate and general” grammatical rules also equally cognitively sound. Third, they contribute to the general pool of information on linguistic features used to formulate assumptions about language typology and language universals. To illustrate, this paper contrasts competing linguistic analyses of certain features in the phonology of the Arabic variety of Cairo, commonly known as Egyptian Colloquial Arabic (henceforth, ECA).

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ECA is spoken as a native language by approximately twenty million Egyptians and widely understood by a majority of the other two hundred million Arabic-speaking peoples. The paper then considers if information gleaned from studying the acquisition of ECA as a first language can guide our selection from the competing analyses to the one that best meets the criteria of adequacy, generality, and cognitive relevance, as well.

II. ECA Phonology There is general consensus among linguists on the analysis of most features of the phonological system of ECA. Thus, all linguists of Arabic, as Table I shows, agree on the independent phonemic status of at least twenty-one consonant segments in ECA. These consonant phonemes are /b, t, d, k, g, s, f, s, z, h, l, m, n, w, y, r, ?, x, G, H, and c/. However, some issues of disagreement persist as to how best to analyze four categories; namely, emphatic consonants and vowels, long vowels, syllable types, and stress assignment rules. The first issue concerns whether emphasis in ECA is rule generated or not. The second has to do with whether long vowels are best treated as single phonemes or as sequences of two identical, short phonemes. The third issue is whether ECA has syllable structures with a VV nucleus, and the final issue concerns the environment for stress assigning rules. The latter three issues are in fact inter-dependent, as will become evident in the ensuing discussion. In the following sections, the traditional analysis of ECA will be contrasted to alternate alternative ones, if any, and results from acquisition of ECA as a first language will be incorporated in the discussion. We begin by discussing the issue of emphasis, which involves emphatic consonants and vowels.

III. Emphasis To the undisputed twenty-one consonant phonemes, many linguists, e.g. Mitchell (1956) and Omar (1973), follow the traditional analysis of Arabic phonology by adding four other consonantal segments (D, T, Z, and S) as phonemes that are integral to the sound system of ECA. All four ECA segments are said to be emphatic Two more

Voiceless Voiced Voiceless Voiced

Trill Lateral Nasal

Fricative

Liquid

w

m

f

b

r l n

s z

t d

[R] [L]

(S) (Z)

(T) (D)

Dento-Alveolar NonEmphatic emphatic

Segments in ( ) are subject to debate. Segments in [ ] are marginal.

Semivowel

Sibilant

Voiceless Voiced

Stop

Manner of Articulation

Labial

y

PalatoAlveolar and Palatal

k g

Velar

Place of Articulation

Table 1. Consonant Phonemes in ECA

x G

[q]

Uvular

H c

Pharyngeal

h

?

Glottal

acquisition of arabic as a native language 21

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emphatic consonants, [L] and [R], are occasionally added to the ECA consonant phonemes; however, because they are often considered marginal, our presentation will focus momentarily on the frequently added four consonants. There is debate over whether the segments (D, T, Z, and S) would be best characterized accoustically as emphatic or articulatorily as velarized. Mitchell (1990: 27–30) gives an extensive description of their articulatory process in Arabic and argues for using the term emphasis over velarization. In contrast, Omar (1973: 25) argues that velarization is a better linguistic term but, nonetheless, opts to use the traditional term of emphasis. Details of this debate are skipped here as they are not relevant to the current discussion (cf. Watson 2002 for further discussion). The term emphasis will be used in this paper because it is the term most commonly used in the literature. Linguists (e.g. Omar 1973 and Mitchell 1990) who argue for independent phonemic status for the emphatic consonants (D, T, Z, and S) support their case by appealing mainly to two arguments: The first is psychological and reflects the desire to preserve Arabic grammatical tradition and maintain the link between standard and colloquial varieties of Arabic. The second argument is linguistic and concerns upholding the generality and symmetry of the system of phonological oppositions in Arabic. The first argument is based on the fact that traditional analysis of all Arabic varieties recognizes emphasis in consonants as a segmentbound phenomenon. Accordingly, these grammars treat emphatic consonants as independent phonemes and Arabic orthography duly assigns them separate letters in the alphabet. One advantage of extending this analysis to the emphatic consonants in the dialect of ECA is preserving the integrity and continuity of the traditional analysis and maintaining the link between the modern spoken dialects and the classical and standard varieties. This conclusion in itself is psychologically welcomed by many Arab nationals, who perceive all varieties of Arabic as a single, albeit, heterogeneous entity. Obviously, however, this argument is social or psychological, but not phonological. The second argument used by linguists who posit the emphatic phonemes appeals to the notion of symmetry of the ECA phonological system. They argue that a general characteristic of Arabic consonant systems is their organization in symmetrical sets of consonant pairs that contrast in only one distinctive feature. ECA consonants tend to contrast in voicing and continuance. Including the four

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emphatic consonants in the phonemic inventory of ECA extends the domain of contrasts in the categories of stops and fricatives to a larger number of ECA consonants, making the domain of the system of opposition more general as seen below: Voiced: Voiceless:

b d z (D) g G c t s (T) k x H

Fricative: Stop:

s d (S) (Z) t z (T) (D)

In addition, by including the emphatic consonants as phonemes, we capture a generalization because a third set of contrasts can be added to include the consonant phonemes differentiated by the presence or absence of emphasis: Emphatic: Non-emphatic:

T D S Z t d s z

Excluding them, however, costs us that generalization and reduces the set of contrasting consonants to the following: Voiced: Voiceless:

b d z g G c t s k x H

Fricative: Stop:

s z t d

Thus, the crux of the linguistic argument for including the emphatic consonants as independent phonemes in ECA is to have a more general characterization where ECA consonants, other than a few accidental gaps, contrast phonemically along one or more of three distinctive features: voicing, continuance, and/or emphasis. Emphasis is not limited to consonants, but also extends to ECA vowels. The traditional analysis identifies five vowel phonemes for ECA: /i/, /e/, /a/, /u/, and /o/. All are non-emphatic. As far as emphasis is concerned, each vowel phoneme is said to have an emphatic allophone. Their distribution is governed by an assimilation rule as the emphatic vowel variants occur only in the phonetic environment of an emphatic consonant (cf. Mitchell 1956: 2 and Harrell 1957: 61). Thus while the traditional analysis treats emphasis as a segment bound phenomenon in the consonants, it treats it as a rulegenerated process in the vowels. This inconsistent treatment has in fact spurred another side debate in Arabic phonology as to whether vowels assimilate to consonants, or vice versa. Evidently, the debate is circular, for one cannot judge with certainty which of the two causes the assimilation since the emphatic consonants and vowels always co-occur. The traditional analysis of the consonantal ECA system seems to

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meet the criteria of adequacy and generality. However, when examining both emphatic consonants and vowels together, its adequacy and generality begin to falter. Perhaps this faltering is the reason why the traditional analysis is challenged by a competing alternate analysis which questions the legitimacy of the phonemic status ascribed to the four “emphatic” consonants. Some linguists, e.g. Harrell (1957: 25 & 1960: 82), Ghaly (1961: 6) and Lehn (1963: 29), do not subscribe to the aforementioned, commonly accepted analysis of (D, T, Z, and S) as independent phonemes. Instead, they argue that they should be classified as allophones of their non-emphatic corresponding variants /d, t, z, and s/, respectively. To these linguists, emphasis is best seen as a prosodic or suprasegmental feature whose minimal domain is the syllable. Therefore, they advocate positing a suprasegmental phoneme, which they call /emphasis/, to account for the occurrence of emphatic segments in ECA. Consequently, whereas the traditional view posits four consonant phonemes and an assimilation rule to account for (D, T, Z, and S) together with the five emphatic vowel allophones, the alternate analysis needs only the suprasegmental phoneme /emphasis/ to account for both the emphatic consonants and vowels. The alternative analysis, therefore, captures a generalization that the traditional one fails to demonstrate. Furthermore, the alternate analysis presents a set of fewer phonemes and by and large begins to look more general and adequate than the traditional analysis. This view is further validated when we consider the case of [L] and [R] which the traditional analysis adds to the consonantal inventory of ECA as marginal phonemes (cf. Table I). These two segments are also accounted for in the alternate analysis by the suprasegmental phoneme /emphasis/. Hence, the alternate analysis eliminates the need for two additional phonemes and renders redundant the issue of marginality, which is difficult to explain in this case except lexically. This further confirms its superiority over the traditional approach. In fact, the alternate analysis also resolves the side debate about the source of emphasis assimilation in ECA: vowel to consonant, or vice versa? In the traditional analysis the argument is circular, for one cannot discriminate between the two causes the assimilation since the emphatic consonants and vowels always co-occur. The alternate analysis, however, not only eliminates this moot issue altogether, but also explains the co-occurrence adequately because its suprasegmental

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phoneme /emphasis/ operates at the syllable level, simultaneously influencing vowels and consonants alike. The two analyses are almost equally adequate and general in their treatment of the consonants in ECA. The alternate analysis, though, offers a far reaching and more consistent treatment of both consonants and vowels. It suggests an analysis that captures the nature of emphasis as a prosodic phenomenon in ECA, proposes fewer phonemes, and bypasses circular debates. Therefore, it is more adequate and more general than the traditional analysis. The superiority of the alternate analysis is corroborated by evidence from research on the acquisition of ECA as a first language. In the case study of her daughter’s language development between six months and one year, Ezz Eldine (1989) reports that her child acquired emphasis as a suprasegmental phoneme rather than a segmental one. Evidence for that analysis comes from Ezz Eldine’s observation that while her child acquired non-emphatic consonants and vowels sequentially and individually, she (1) simultaneously produced all empahtic variants and (2) emphasis appeard in the language production of the child at the syllable level, often crossing syllable boundaries. There is a possibility that the child intitially overgeneralized the phonetic rule of emphasis, but that possibilty remains distand for two reasons: (1) the language data does not show instances of subsequent rule narrowing, and (2) later stages of language production obscure the process because emphasis in consonants and vowels always cooccur. The analysis that is more general and adequate happens to be the one that is also cognitively sound, further confirming the validity of its selection over the traditional ones.

IV. Vowel Length As mentioned earlier, analysis of ECA phonology identifies the five vowel phonemes /i/, /e/, /a/, /u/, and /o/ and points out that these vowels occur as both short and long. The issue of vowel length in ECA is handled in one of two ways by linguists. Some, e.g. Mitchell (1956: 2 & 111), analyze long vowels as reduplications of their short equivalents, basing their analysis on numerical economy. An alternate analysis, e.g. Harrell (1957: 61), classifies vowel length as a sixth phoneme.

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First language acquisition input (cf. Elgibali 1986 & 2003 and Ezz Eldine 1989) points out the fact that Egyptian children acquire their vowels in the following order: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Low front /a/ Mid vowels: Mid-front /e/ and Mid-back /o/ High front /i/ High back /u/ Length Emphasis

Phonetically, Egyptian children produce long vowels frequently during the babbling stage; however, they begin to produce it in a meaningful way around the age of 16 months. When they do so, long vowel variants of all the short vowels the child has acquired appear simultaneously, suggesting that vowel length is not lexeme-bound but the output of a rule-generated phonological process. Thus input from language acquisition clearly supports the analysis which explains vowel length in ECA as a phoneme in its own right.

V. Syllable Structure Traditional descriptions of ECA recognize five structural syllable types: CV, CVV, CVC, CVVC, and CVCC (cf. Mitchell 1956: 113). An ECA syllable has the following general characteristics: an onset consisting of a single consonant and a rime that has a vocalic nucleus and an optional coda that may have a maximum of two consonant clusters. An intersyllabic VV sequence consists of two reduplicated short vowels. Syllables of the structure CVVC can only occur in word final position. If affixation creates an environment where that syllable no longer occupies final position, re-syllabification takes place, e.g. /mak-tuub/ ‘it (masc.) is written’ becomes /mak-tuu-ba/ ‘it (fem.) is written’ when the feminine suffix [-a] is affixed. Typically, CV and CVV syllables are the predominant syllable types in the pre-speech babbling stage of Egyptian children (cf. Ezz Eldine 1989). Similar to what has been observed for acquisition of other mother tongues (cf. Jusczyk et al.: 1994), at this stage children acquiring ECA extract starts from utterance beginnings. In the case of ECA, these starts by default have a CV(V) structure. The CV syllable, which is typologically the least marked syllable

acquisition of arabic as a native language

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type, is the first to be acquired and produced by these children. By the age of ten months, acquisition of the concept of syllable as a discrete linguistic form is confirmed by systematic production of the unmarked CV syllable type: First attempts at producing one-word utterances appear in single CV syllables, e.g. [ a] ‘sign of discomfort’ or [ma] ‘mother, female, or food’. This observation is further confirmed by the fact that the next phase in approximating the production of words fully involves mainly those words that employ syllables of this type in reduplicated forms, e.g. / a a/ ‘sign of discomfort’, [mama] for /maama/ ‘mother, female, or food’, [baba] for /baaba/ ‘father or male’. The initial consonantal onset in CV syllables that are produced till age one is normally a member of a limited set of stops: /?/, /m/, /b/, /w/, /f/ and /l/. The vowel nucleus in that syllable type is overwhelmingly the low front vowel /a/. CVV syllables are the next syllable structure acquired by Egyptian children. It first appears in more successful attempts to produce words constructed earlier unsuccessfully using CV rather than CVV syllables. Thus words like /maama/ ‘mother’ and /baaba/ ‘father’ are produced fully in this stage with CVV syllables as [maama] and [baaba], not partially with CV syllables as was the case in the stage of first syllable acquisition. Given the fact, however, that ECA also has a CVC syllable structure, the acquisition of CVV syllables before CVC syllables appears inconsistent with syllable universal hierarchies, whether typological (cf. Fudge 1969) or developmental (cf. Levelt and Van de Vijver 2000). This apparent inconsistency warrants further consideration. Traditional descriptions of ECA consider the CVV syllable as independent of the CV syllable. The primary motivation for this analysis is reducing from ten to five the number of vowel phonemes posited for ECA. Yet this desire for numerical economy, legitimate as it may be, runs contrary to other typological and developmental indicators which support an alternate analysis that posits ten vowels phonemes for ECA, five short vowels and five corresponding long vowels. Typologically, language universals studies do not list CVV structures as a possible syllable type in world languages (Greenberg 1966). This is probably the case because, universally, while a syllable may have complex onsets and codas, it can only have one nucleus (Kager 1999). Developmentally, the data gleaned from Egyptian children show that the phonemic opposition between short and long vowels is acquired either simultaneous to or closely after the acquisition of the

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linguistic concept of syllable. Furthermore, children begin to produce all long vowels simultaneously. It is reasonable then for children to incorporate that newly acquired feature of phonemic length in their production of words that mandate the use of long vowels, thus conforming to acquisition and typology parameters and maximizing the frequency of using open syllables. The need to do so is made all the more urgent given the high frequency of ECA words that require the use of long vowels; namely words referring to caretakers and expression of needs. Thus, it would seem that children analyze CVV sequences as a CV syllable. The often quoted order of acquisition for syllables in ECA is CV, CVV, CVC, CVVC, and CVCC. However, in the light of first language acquisition data, a new order can be established as: CV, length, CVC, and CVCC.

VI. Conclusion The foregoing discussion has shown that incorporating findings from first language acquisition into linguistic analysis can only be beneficial. Such findings can help us choose between competing analyses, confirm and validate our selection based on cognitive data, and arrive at an analysis that is equally adequate, general and cognitively sound.

CHAPTER THREE

A CASE FOR AN INTER-ARABIC GRAMMAR Ali Farghaly

1

Organization of the Chapter

This chapter is organized in three parts. In Part 1, the basic assumptions and observational motivations to realize that an inter-Arabic grammar exists are laid down, as are the reasons for defining it. Part 2 has a preliminary attempt to explain this core grammar. The applications that may arise from specifying a core Arabic grammar are examined in Part 3, as are the author’s suggestions for further research along the same lines on other varieties of Arabic. 1.1

Underlying Assumptions

This research arises from the assumption that all varieties of Arabic have some common ground that need to be identified and described. Much effort has been made over the past fifty years to describe and delineate the differences that exist among colloquial dialects of Arabic and between spoken and Classical Arabic. This also came as a result of the pioneering work of Ferguson (1959a) who correctly defined diglossia as two or more varieties of a language existing side by side with well defined functions for each. Arabic native speakers shift from the High variety to the Low variety and vice versa in well defined contexts. This indicates that native speakers not only have grammars of both varieties but that they also internalize the rules that govern the switch from one variety to the other. Ferguson also showed that such a linguistic situation is not unique to Arabic, but also exists in different languages such as Greek. In another important paper (Ferguson 1959b), he argues that historically speaking, Arabic colloquials did not develop from Classical Arabic; they existed side by side with Classical Arabic from the beginning. To prove his point he cites fourteen linguistic features that all

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Arabic dialects have and in which they all differ from Classical Arabic. Most of these differences involve phonological and morphological regular alternations such as the loss of the final glottal stop in words like Sa ar ‘desert’, spreading of pausal forms, loss of most dual forms and of case endings, etc. In this chapter, I would like to propose the initiation of a line of research aimed at defining what it is that constitutes Arabic. This in turn is based on the assumption that there is a single entity that is the Arabic language which has well defined phonological, morphological and syntactic properties. This assumption rests on the proposal that all three main varieties of Arabic, Classical Arabic (CA), the colloquials and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), have a common core or an inter-Arabic grammar that this chapter seeks to identify and define. As a first step in this line of research, we begin with defining the core grammar of Egyptian Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic. 1.2

Significance and Implications

While the languages of ancient civilizations—Confucianism, Hinduism, Christianity—have undergone major structural and orthographic changes over time, Islam is the only one whose language has survived intact and is still in use as a national language serving as a symbol of ethnicity and as an official language for the press, governmental documents, education, law, constitutions, etc. in all Arab countries. Most sociolinguists are concerned with cases of variability, but when it comes to Arabic, what needs to be explained is not variability but rather the stability of a language that is not anyone’s mother tongue (Holt 1996) and the stability of a diglossic situation which is regarded by many as problematic and transient (Ferguson 1959a & 1996, Kaye 1970, and Mahmoud 1982 & 1986). Holt’s statement about the need for an explanation of the stability of the Arabic language is extremely important. The common explanation for the relative stability of the Arabic language is the impact of the Qur an, which, though it plays an important role in stabilizing the Arabic language, cannot be the sole explanation. 75% of world’s Moslems perform all Islamic rituals and prayers in Arabic though they speak languages other than Arabic both as official languages and for everyday communication.

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Thus, theoretically speaking, nothing could have prevented the Arabic language from undergoing major changes while Arabs would continue performing their rituals like all other Moslems who are not native speakers of Arabic. While recognizing the role of the Qur an in stabilizing the Arabic language and narrowing down dialectal differences among Arabic speakers, this chapter seeks to identify some intrinsic properties that all varieties of Arabic share, taking into account Holes’ plausible warning (Holes 1995) that speakers’ perception of how close or distant languages and/or varieties could be is often affected by attitudinal, historical, political and religious factors. Such perceptions may not hold against objective linguistic evidence. One of the objectives of this chapter is to provide an answer to the question: What is it then that stabilizes the diglossic situation and impedes the Arabic dialects from evolving into separate languages? Consider the daily life of an illiterate Egyptian who speaks with family and friends in Egyptian Arabic, listens to the news on the radio in MSA and performs prayers in CA. Do native speakers of Arabic have three separate different grammars in their minds? Do they have an inter-Arabic grammar that can easily be further tuned to accommodate other variations of Arabic? In this chapter I will present the view that there is a core grammar of Arabic that needs to be fully described. This core grammar is shared by all varieties of Arabic. This core grammar accounts for the mutual intelligibility among all speakers of Arabic and the ability of illiterate Moslems to understand the Qur an. It defines precisely what is shared among varieties of Arabic and provides objective linguistic evidence for the relatedness hypothesis that I assume in this chapter. The description of this core grammar has far reaching implications for TAFL programs in dealing with diglossia (Al-Batal 1992). Instead of teaching the grammar of MSA separately from the grammar of the dialects, a grammar course or the grammatical component of a course may illustrate grammatical points by examples from varieties of Arabic. Thus learners of Arabic can see the common grounds shared by dialects, MSA and CA. On the basis of this they can, like native speakers of Arabic, internalize the core grammar of the Arabic language.

32 1.3

chapter three Generative Grammar and Arabic Linguistics

The notion of diglossia dominated the scene of linguistic research on Arabic in the last four decades. Research in Arabic linguistics implicitly regarded the systems of the written language, represented mostly in either Classical Arabic for more formal texts or in Modern Standard Arabic for newspapers and current affairs, and the systems of the colloquials as distinct, which to a certain extent is true, and thus were described separately. Chomsky’s emphasis on the importance of the ideal native speaker in linguistic research and that the aim of a linguistic description of a language was to characterize explicitly the intuitions of its native speakers and that these intuitions are manifested in the native speaker’s judgments on the grammaticality of sentences in his language had a profound effect on the work in Arabic linguistics. Many linguists refrained from working on Classical Arabic or Modern Standard Arabic since there were no native speakers of these varieties. How could they, then, validate their analyses by native speakers’ judgments as required by Chomsky (1965). On the other hand, the colloquials of Arabic were acquired naturally and therefore linguists’ analyses can be checked adequately against native speakers’ judgments. It is not surprising then that the first dissertation written to test Government and Binding theory on Arabic was testing the theory against the facts of Egyptian Arabic (Farghaly 1981) and not Modern Standard Arabic or Classical Arabic. Even some Arab linguists (Elgibali 1996) considered research on Classical Arabic outside the realm of generative grammar because it is not a native language for anyone and it might not be a natural language as it is not acquired naturally like any other natural language. 1.4

The Teaching of Arabic as a Foreign Language

The notion of diglossia is entrenched in the minds of program directors in Near Eastern departments as is the general assumptions that there are two different linguistic systems: one for the written language and the other for different sub systems of colloquials that spread over Arab countries. Therefore it was natural to create separate courses; some teaching Modern Standard Arabic to students who need to read and write Arabic and others in the different colloquials targeted at students with an interest in communicating orally with

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speakers from a specific region. Students of Arabic as a foreign language are often frustrated because even when they learn one colloquial variety of Arabic they still can not communicate with Arabic speakers of different varieties while they observe that native speakers of Arabic can. Arabic diglossia poses a problem in the teaching of Arabic as a foreign language. The question of how to address Arabic Diglossia in the classroom has been debated for a long time and the profession is not reaching a consensus on the issue (Al-Batal 1992 and Alosh 1997). Dealing with Arabic Diglossia in Arabic classes has become urgent as a result of the increasing interest in the Arabic culture and in using Arabic to communicate with Arabic native speakers among students. The adoption of the proficiency approach to teaching Arabic has necessitated the incorporation of at least one colloquial variety to enable students to communicate naturally in Arabic. Thus students can achieve communicative competence as well as cultural diversity. 1.5

Modeling Arabic Native Speakers

Chomsky (2001) takes the object of linguistic research to be the internal property of the human mind, namely, the biological component of the brain that is responsible for the faculty of language. The specific language that a human acquires results from the interaction of three factors: 1. Primary linguistic data (PLD): the PLD represents the utterances a child is exposed to when he is born, It varies depending on the speech community the child lives in. On the basis of this PLD, the child selects from the options that S0 allows. 2. S0: This is the universal grammar that all children are born with regardless of the speech community they are born in. It is what children come to the world equipped with as part of their human endowment. It may be regarded as state zero in the language acquisition process. S0 parameters are fixed by PLD, hence it is a product of evolution. 3. General properties of organic systems such as conditions of computational efficiency and the interface condition that an organ must satisfy for it to function at all. Since Arabic speakers have no difficulty tuning in to various varieties or levels (Badawi 1973) of Arabic, for considerations of economy

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and efficiency we may assume that they do not have three different unrelated grammars in their minds, but rather one Arabic grammar that has a core representing invariant properties of Arabic and peripherals consisting of variations.

2

Description of the Inter-Arabic Grammar

We adopt here the Chomskyan view of grammar. We take grammar to mean everything that a speaker of a language knows about his language including phonology, morphology, syntax, etc. We will limit ourselves here to some aspects in the phonology, morphology and syntax of Arabic. The account we present here is not exhaustive since we are reporting on research in progress. 2.1

Phonology

A general tendency in the phonology of the dialects is that they have richer vowel inventory while the consonants are more restricted than MSA. The reduction in the consonantal system arises from the neutralization of some phonological contrasts (Holes 1995). For example, in Egyptian Arabic the distinction between the interdental fricatives and the alveolar fricatives is lost to the advantage of the alveolar fricative. So /¶/ and /z/ are pronounced as /z/ and /y/ and /s/ are pronounced as /s/. However, there are some interesting similarities. For example, segmental phonemes in both MSA and Egyptian Arabic (EA) are characterized by two important phonemic distinctions namely vowel length and pharyngalization in consonants. Both varieties have minimal pairs with pharyngealized (or emphatic) and non-pharyngealized consonant that show the phonemic distinction of pharyngrealization as shown in (1) and (2): (1) /b t/ ‘spent the night’; /b T/ ‘armpit’; /xass/ ‘he lost weight’; /xaSS/ ‘lettuce’—EA (2) /s r/ ‘he walked’; /S r/ ‘became’; /dall/ ‘guide, point at’; /Dall/ ‘lose one’s way’—MSA Examples that illustrate vowel length as phonemic are shown below in (3) and (4):

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(3) /xall/ ‘vinegar’; /x l/ ‘uncle’; /bass/ ‘only’; /b s/ ‘kissed’— EA (4) /sa al/ ‘ask’; /s al/ ‘to question’; / agar/ ‘trees’: / gar/ ‘to quarrel’—MSA Moreover, syllable structure in the two varieties differs in that EA allows a consonant cluster in initial position such as in /mraatu/ ‘his wife’ and /nruuH/ ‘we go’, whereas MSA does not. Both MSA and EA have syllables of the structure: CV, CVC, CVCC CVV, and CVVC. Neither of them allows a consonant cluster of more than two consonants. Some important phonological processes are operative both in MSA and EA. The assimilation rule of the definite article is a case in point. There are also systematic phonological alternations between EA and MSA such as the fact that interdental fricatives in MSA become alveolar or dental in EA. Examples are shown below in (5) and (6). (5) /tal ta/ ‘three’; /surayya/ ‘a female name’; /zanb/ ‘guilt’— EA (6) /yal ya/ ‘three’, /yurayya/ ‘a female name’; /¶anb/ ‘guilt’— MSA Both MSA and EA are syllable—stressed languages and not timestress as the case in English for example. Stress in EA and MSA is predictable because it is partially determined by the structure of the syllable. For example in both of them stress will fall on the first syllable in words that have the structure CVCVC, whereas stress shifts to the second syllable when the words has the structure CVCVCC which is realized when adding a suffix to the word as in /katab/ ‘he wrote’ and /katabt/ ‘I wrote’. 2.2

Morphology

1. One of the most important characteristics of Arabic morphology is its strong derivational property. All lexical words (verbs and nouns) can be reduced to a relatively small number of roots. McCarthy (1981) argues that the root in Classical Arabic represents a distinct level of analysis, and he shows that there are constraints on what make up a well formed root in Arabic. It is primarily through infixation that Arabic stems are formed, and they can be analyzed at two levels: the consonantal root and the vocalism.

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McCarthy (ibid.) shows also that there are constraints governing the quality of formation of vocalisms. Thus Arabic stems are formed from two discontinuous structures: consonantal root and a vocalism. The consonantal root represents the lexical meaning whereas the vocalism can be either a grammatical morpheme or a derivational one. Consider the simple noun for the word ‘writer’ (7) /k tib/ ‘writer’ It consists of the discontinuous root /k, t, b/ (called radicals) and the two vowels: the long / / after the first consonant and an /i/ vowel following the second radical. While Arabic stems are formed primarily by the infixation of the vocalism and some affixes into the root, the different inflected words are formed largely by adding prefixes and suffixes. Therefore Arabic inflectional morphology, unlike Arabic derivational morphology, is highly regular and concatenative. The prefixes and suffixes occur in a strict linear order. Consider: (8) /wa-sa-na-hzim-hum/, ‘and—will-we-defeat-them’—MSA In (8) we have three prefixes: the conjunction word ‘waw’, the future marker ‘s n’ and the first person subject plural marker ‘n n’. They have to come in that order. No other order is possible as shown below: (9) *sa+wa+na+hzim+hum—*sa+na+wa+hzim+hum—*wa+na+ sa+hzim+hum—MSA The same holds for EA as shown in (10) and (11) below. (10) wi+Ha+ni+hzim+hum ‘and-will-we-defeat-them’ and we will defeat them. (11) *Ha+wi+ni+hzim+hum—*Ha+ni+wi+hzim+hum—wi+ni+ Ha+hzim+hum The above examples show that both MSA and EA follow the same principles and constraints in the construction of Arabic words. We also note that EA follows the same morphological derivational processes that characterize CA and MSA in that consonants carry the lexical meaning that is constant across all derivations that share the same root. The vocalism largely conveys the different grammatical categories. Consider the examples from EA in (12).

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(12) /g b/ ‘he brought’, /g yib/ ‘bringing’, /mag yib/ ‘things brought’, /yig b/ ‘he brings’, /mig ba/ ‘answered or brought’—EA 2. Both varieties have regular masculine plural, regular feminine plural and broken plural forms. In both of them verbs take pronominal suffixes which are very similar. 3. In both varieties imperfect stems have obligatory prefixes like /ya/, /ta/, /na/, / a/ as person markers, whereas perfect verbs have suffixes as /tu/, /ta/, /ti/, /tum/, /n /, / / to mark person distinctions. For a very interesting discussion and analysis of the distribution and significance of the prefix/suffix asymmetry between perfect verbs and imperfect verbs see Benmamoun (2000) where he examines data from MSA, EA, Moroccan Arabic and SanAni (Yemeni) Arabic. Benmamoun (ibid.) presents a plausible alternative analysis to the one presented by McCarthy (1981) on the grammatical morpheme of tense in MSA. He argues that tense does not reside in the vocalism of the perfect and imperfect verbs but rather in the distribution of the prefixes and suffixes of such verbs. 4. Both varieties share the same set of independent subject pronouns with some variations in the pronunciation. Examples are: (13) /ana/ ‘I’; /inta/ ‘you masc sing’; /inti/ ‘you fem sing’; /intu/ ‘you plural’; /huwwa/ ‘he’; /hiyya/ ‘she’; /humma/ ‘they’; /iHna/ ‘we’—EA (14) /ana/ ‘I’; /anta/ ‘you masc sing’; /anti/ ‘you fem sing’; / antum/ ‘you masc pl’; /antunna/ ‘you fem pl’; /huwa/ ‘he’; /hiya/ ‘she’; /hum/ ‘they masc’; /hunna/ ‘they fem’; /naHnu/ ‘we’—MSA We notice here the simplification of the pronominal system in EA by eliminating the dual pronouns and the feminine plural pronoun. 5. The same possessive pronouns are used in both varieties. The following are examples of words from both varieties with some possessive pronouns. (15) /kit ‘her (16) /kit ‘her

b+i/ ‘my book’; /b t+hum/ ‘their house’; /jibet+ha/ skirt’—EA b+i/ ‘my book’; /baytu+hum/ ‘their house’; /gonilit+ha/ skirt’—MSA

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Syntax

2.3.1 PRO Drop Parameter All varieties of Arabic have the property of the optional deletion of the subject of a sentence observing the universal condition on the recoverability of deletion. EA (17) /ana i t fi ilkuweit xamas sin n/ I lived in Kuwait five years I lived in Kuwait for five years. (18) / i t fi ilkuweit xamas sin n/ lived in Kuwait five years I lived in Kuwait for five years MSA (19) /q la al+ra s anna+hu sayHDur al+iHtif l/ said the president that he will attend the celebration The president said that he would attend the celebration. (20) /q la inna+hu sayHDur al+iHtif l/ Said that he will attend the celebration He said that he would attend the celebration. Eid (1980) and Farghaly (1982) argue that subject pronouns in Egyptian Arabic, though optional, serve an important communicative function in discourse. Consider: EA (21) mona Mona

gat wi came and

ma it left

In (21), /mona/ is the subject of both verbs. The subject pronoun of the second verb is deleted. When the subject pronoun of the second verb is present, the following occurs: (22) mona Mona

gat wi came and

hoda Hoda

ma it left

The subject of the second verb has a different referent than /mona/. Therefore, the presence or absence of the subject pronoun could result in a different interpretation. Now consider the same facts with respect to MSA:

a case for an inter-arabic grammar (23) HaDarat came

mona Mona

wa and

39

nSarafat left

is normally interpreted as Mona came and left, while (24) HaDarat Came

mona Mona

wa and

nSarafat left

Hoda Hoda

has the reading where the two different verbs do not refer to the same individual. 2.3.2 Definiteness Definiteness plays a crucial role in the derivation of Arabic syntactic structures in particular noun phrases, nominal sentences and the iD fa construction. Farghaly (1981) shows that in Egyptian Arabic the definiteness feature is the only distinctive features that distinguishes constituents such as in (25) from those as in (26) EA (25) il+bint Taw la the girl tall The girl is tall. (26) il+bint il+Taw la the girl the tall The tall girl. The sentences in (25) and (26) consist each of a Noun Phrase (NP) followed by an Adjectival Phrase (AP). The only, very important, distinction between (25) and (26) is that in (25) the NP and the AP do not agree in definiteness. General constraints on Arabic subjects tell us that they must be definite, we can just say that the AP is indefinite whereas in (26) both the NP and the AP agree in definiteness. (25) is a sentence whereas (26) is a noun phrase and not a sentence. For example (26) can function as a direct object of a sentence whereas (25) cannot as shown in (27) and (28) respectively. (27) ana a raf il+bint I know the girl I know the tall girl.

il+Taw la the tall

(28) ana a raf il+bint I know the girl

Taw la tall

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The same facts hold for MSA. Consider: (29) al+mudarris aÎ m the teacher great The teacher is great. (30) al+mudarris al+ aÎ m the teacher the-great The great teacher. (31) * hadtu saw (32)

al+mudarris the teacher

hadtu al+mudarris saw the teacher I saw the great teacher.

aÎ m great al+ aÎ m the great

We propose here the Disagreement Principle: X is indefinite Where X is the predicate in an equative sentence and X = NP or AP. 2.3.3 The iD fa Construction 1. In generative syntax all syntactic structures are represented in terms of a projection of a head, the head being a two-value universal parameter. Both EA and MSA are head initial since prepositions precede and govern their complements. Similarly, verbs precede and govern their objects. Chomsky (1965) asserts that differences among natural languages are minimal and proposes a universal basic structure for the description of any language. The basic structure consists of a head, say X, that merges with its complement to form an X' constituent which in turn merges with a specifier to form X". The X is either lexical or functional, the X' is an intermediate structure whereas the X" is the maximal projection. Guided by this fragment of Universal Grammar, I will look into the structure of the iD fa construct. In every language there is a way to relate X to Y when X owns Y, X is a part of Y, or X has a special relation to Y. In EA and MSA genitive phrases, or the iD fa construct, are formed by putting two nouns adjacent to each other to indicate the meaning of possession or relatedness. The two nouns form a single noun phrase with features derived in a well defined way

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from the features of its constituents and observed by other major constituents in the sentence when they enter into syntactic operations such as agreement with the iD fa construct. Consider: (34) uft saw I saw I saw

mud r al+bank manager the bank the new manager of the the manager of the new

(35) ra aytu saw I saw the I saw the (36) * uft saw

il+gid d the new bank bank

mud ra l+bank il+jad d manager the bank the new new manager of the bank manager of the new bank

il+mud r the manager

bank bank

(37) *ra aytu al+mud r bank saw the manager bank (38) mud r il+bank ayy n manager the bank sick The bank manager is sick. (39) mud r ul+bank mar D manager the bank sick The bank manager is sick. (40) sikrit rit al-mud r ayy na secretary the manager sick The secretary of the manager is sick (41) sikrit rit al-mud r mar Da secretary the manager sick The secretary of the manager is sick The iD fa in 34–41 from MSA and EA shows interesting properties. First, the first term is always indefinite whereas the second term is either definite or indefinite. Second, the gender and number of the first term percolate and become the gender and number of the whole construction whereas the definiteness of the second term becomes the value of definiteness of the whole iD fa construction, resulting in the ambiguity shown in (34) and (35) where ‘the new’ could either be the bank or the director. Third, the first term of the

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iD fa acquires its case by virtue of its position and function in a larger syntactic construction whereas the second term of the iD fa is always genitive which suggests it is case assigned and governed by the first term. Fourth, the rules generating the iD fa have to be recursive since there can be an infinite number of embedding within the iD fa. Consider the following: (42) (43) (44) (45)

EA uft mud r il+bank uft mir t mudirr il+bank uft ibn mir t mudirr il+bank uft xaT bit ibn mir t mudirr il+bank

MSA ra ytu mud r al+bank ra ytu zawajatu mud r il+bank ra ytu ibna zawajati mud r il+bank ra ytu xaT bata ibna zawajati mud ri il+bank

We can go on and on adding one iD fa after the other, but the rules remain the same. Every head of an iD fa has to be indefinite, and it is from this that the gender of the whole construct is percolated. The definiteness of the whole construct is percolated from the complement of the head. 2.3.4 Copular Sentences The absence of a copular verb in equative sentences in both MSA and EA observes the rules for the disagreement principle discussed in 2.3.2 above. Copular sentences will normally take an NP subject and the predicate ranges over several syntactic categories such as NP, AP, PrepP, and AdvP. EA (46) iHna kuways n we good We are very good. (47) hiyya ta b na she tired She is very tired.

awi very awi very

MSA (48) Al+jaw jam l il+naharda the weather nice today The weather is nice today.

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(49) ahmad mar D alyawm Ahmed sick today Ahmed is sick today. 2.3.5 Resumptive Pronouns Resumptive pronouns look like any regular pronoun but regular pronouns can be substituted for by a lexical NP and the sentence can still be grammatical. Consider: EA (50) ana uft ahmed imb riH (51) ana uft+u imb riH

MSA ra ytu ahmad ams ra ytuhu ams

In contrast, if we substitute a resumptive pronoun with a regular NP, the result is an ungrammatical sentence as shown below. EA (52) ilmud r ana bakrahu (53) *ilmudir dah ana bakrah ilmud r

MSA almud r ana akrahu *almud r ana akrah h ¶a almud r

Both MSA and EA are characterized by the use of resumptive pronouns in different syntactic categories including relative clauses and topicalization. EA (54) d il+ arabiyya illi i tar +ha this the car which bought-her This is the car which my brother bought.

ax +ya brother my

MSA (55) h ¶ihi hiyya al+say ra allati i tar +ha ax+i this she the car which bought her brother my This is the car which my brother bought. 2.3.6 The Number and Gender System Nouns and adjectives in both varieties have gender and both have to agree in gender. Verbs also agree in gender with their subjects. The number system is similar in both varieties. Use plural nouns with numbers 3–10 and then use singular nouns with numbers above 10. 3. The order of noun/adjective in a noun phrase and the agreement in gender and number between them. In Arabic the noun precedes

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the adjective and the adjective agrees with the preceding noun in number and gender and case. (56) bint Hilwa pretty girl A pretty girl. (57) fat tun jam latun pretty girl A pretty girl. 4. The suffixation of the agreement marker in the perfect and their prefixation in the imperfect. (58) tadrus h ¶ihi alT liba al+luGa al+ingl ziyya studies this fem student the language the English This female student studies the English language (59) darasat h ¶ihi alT liba al+luGa al+ingl ziyya studied this fem student the language the English This female student studied the English language 5. The obligatory nominal after the complementizer / anna/ in MSA and / inn/ in the colloquials. In both varieties of Arabic, the complementizer / anna/ in MSA and / inn/ in the dialects must by followed by a nominal expression or a prepositional phrase. A verb cannot occur in that position. (60) a taqidu anna al+ra s sa+ya+Hdir Hafl al+yawm believe that the president will attend celebration today I believe that the president will attend today’s celebration. (61) *a taqidu believe

anna sa+ya+Hdir al+ra s Hafl al+yawm that will attend the president celebration today

3

Implications

We shall never be able to make a reasonable prediction about the future of the Arabic language unless we perform a synchronic study of both the FuSHa and the Colloquials followed by a diachronic study to determine the direction of change.

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The characterization of the core grammar of Arabic has three important implications. First, it has a profound effect on the design of Arabic teaching materials, classroom teaching, and Arabic learners’ expected linguistic proficiency. Second, it provides a more principled explanation of the stability of the Arabic language. Third, it can be the basis for a computational grammar of Arabic that is more economical than developing a separate grammar for each and every variety of Arabic. 3.1 The TAFL Problems Arabic Diglossia presents serious challenges to speakers of other languages who aim at learning Arabic. Ferguson notes “the teacher and student alike must face the fact that there is more to be learned than just one language; perhaps it is not as much as two full languages, but it is certainly more than is generally attempted in a single language course” (Ferguson 1971: 73). Complaints are often heard from learners of Arabic who could not understand a conversation between native speakers of Arabic after investing time and money in learning Standard Arabic for two or three years. They find it even more difficult to comprehend an Arabic song. Moreover, when they communicate orally with Arabic speakers, they sound artificial and use a variety inappropriate to the occasion. In communicative-based teaching, the teacher finds himself asking questions and talking to students again in a variety not appropriate to the topic of conversation. Therefore, teaching at least one dialect is normally introduced in Arabic language programs, though this introduces the problem of which dialect to teach, and when to teach it. If our objective in teaching Arabic as a foreign language is to approximate native speakers’ competence, and the success of the instruction is measured by how close the learners’ linguistic behavior is to that of native speakers, then we need to specify what constitutes Arabic native speaker competence. If our ideal is educated Arabic speakers, then we know they are native speakers of a dialect, can read and write MSA and very often mix the forms of the two in ways that need to be defined. Alosh (1997) sums up the problem, saying: Needless to say, neither the single-variety approach, nor the colloquial c-based alternative approach, nor the MSA-based approach, nor the separate sequence approach provides a viable alternative to the present linguistic situation. What is needed is an approach that addresses sociolinguistic appropriateness, as reflected by the linguistic behavior

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chapter three of the educated native speaker, while also being sensitive to academic needs and objectives that emphasize the importance of reading MSA” (Alosh 1997: 103).

3.1.1 Solution Al-Batal (1992) discusses different classroom approaches to Arabic Diglossia. The Classical Arabic (CA) approach is to concentrate on reading and writing and the teaching of CA with heavy emphasis on traditional Arabic grammar. This approach ignores the problem of Diglossia. The shortcoming of this approach is that it does not develop the learners’ overall proficiency in Arabic. The MSA approach teaches contemporary standard Arabic and employs it for oral communication as well as for reading more recent writings. Although this approach uses oral skills to reinforce the learning of vocabulary and grammar, it suffers from teaching a spoken form in situations that are not normally used by native speakers for the same purpose. The Colloquial approach concentrates on the teaching of a dialect for oral communication. While this approach attends to the needs of learners who aim at speaking and understanding spoken Arabic, it does not offer any training in reading and writing. Finally, Al-Batal proposes an alternative approach which reflects . . . the diglossic situation (with its different varieties) as it exists in the Arab World today. It should introduce MSA as a variety that is mainly written but also spoken in a multitude of situations. It should also introduce an Arabic dialect as a variety that is used mainly for daily life communication . . . (Al-Batal 1992: 298).

This approach aims at modeling the educated native speaker, though a precise account of the linguistic behavior of the educated Arabic speakers is needed. Alosh (1997) conducted a very important analysis of 20 half-hour recorded interviews in a formal situation with educated Arab speakers from different Arab countries. The interviewees were asked to speak in MSA. Analysis of the recorded interviews showed a great deal of variability both among speakers and within the speech of individual speakers. It also confirmed the Contradictory Effect Constraint and the Directionality Constraint proposed in Eid (1988). Alosh points out correctly that this variability is absent from almost all Arabic classrooms where at any point what is taught is a single variety. Another advantage of this approach is that it treats the varieties of Arabic as an integrated linguistic system, not as discrete and sep-

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arate entities. Students in this approach are presented with the appropriate variety for the particular function being taught. For example, they may listen to a formal speech in MSA but listen to a joke in the colloquial variety. The grammatical structures taught in this approach should complement the particular function in the lesson. Al-Batal cites four advantages for this approach: 1. It will introduce truly authentic materials in both form and function. 2. It places more emphasis on the communicative skills in Arabic. 3. It provides a well rounded program that satisfies all the needs of the students. 4. It enhances the cultural component of the Arabic curriculum. Teaching materials that reflect the variability of Arabic spoken by educated Arabic speakers have already appeared (al-Batal 1995 and Yonis 1995). In both text books some elements of the colloquials are presented side by side with materials in MSA. This is definitely a step in the right direction. If native speakers have a core grammar of Arabic, then our goal in Arabic instruction would be to help students acquire that grammar. Moreover, evidence suggests that Arabic speakers employ certain strategies when they encounter variations from other dialects. For example, an Egyptian speaker would pronounce the word ‘here’ in Arabic as in (62), but would have no problem understanding the variation of the word, in 63–65. (62) (63) (64) (65)

hina h n hni huna

The reason is that subconsciously, the Egyptian speaker knows that what matters lexically in Arabic is the type and order of consonants. In 62–65 there are only 2 consonants in a fixed order, therefore the vowels can be disregarded. English speakers do not employ such strategies, because in English a slight modification of vowel quality as in caught, coat, cot result in a completely different word with different meaning. For them, 62–65 cannot possibly refer to the same thing. A core grammar of Arabic and specifications of divergence to dialects can be very useful in Arabic classrooms taking advantage of the systematic variations between MSA and the dialects and between one dialect and another.

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Stability of the Arabic Language

The co-existence of Classical Arabic, MSA and EA, serving important communicative functions in society and existing in the minds of Arabic speakers, has minimized their possible divergence into separate languages. I will consider here the case of sentence word order and the structure of the genitive phrase. 3.2.1 Sentence Word Order Most Arabic linguists consider CA and MSA as VSO whereas EA is regarded as an SVO language. However, because both varieties allow subject pronoun deletion, and because MSA and CA allow SVO order in some cases, one can find both VSO and SVO in both varieties. The following is an SVO sentence in MSA. (66) bu yaSilu alq hira Gadan Bush arrives Cairo tomorrow Tomorrow, Bush arrives in Cairo. The coexistence of both sentence orders in the three varieties, though with different distribution, contributes to mutual intelligibility and impedes divergence. 3.2.2 Arabic Genitive Phrase The iD fa construction is the most common way in MSA and CA. It is also common in EA. However, EA and some other dialects have assigned preposition-like words the function of relating two nouns together. Consider: (67) il+ arabiyya bit it the car of The minister’s car.

il+waz r the minister

In Kuwaiti Arabic: (68) il+say ra m l the car of The minister’s car.

il+waz r the minister

Words like /bit ./ and /m l/ here function exactly like the English ‘of ’ in phrases like ‘the cousin of the king’. The interesting observation is that while some Arabic varieties use these constructions, native Arabic speakers also use and definitely understand the same phrase said as an iD fa as shown below:

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(69) arabiyyit il+waz r car the minister The minister’s car. (70) sayy rit il+waz r car the minister The minister’s car. So we have here two constructions existing side by side and used both actively and passively by speakers of Arabic. 3.3

Arabic Computational Grammar

We live in a knowledge-driven global economy. In this economy, knowledge and information are extremely important, and the most common medium for encoding them is language. Research in natural language processing (NLP) has received great attention from global businesses and foreign governments. After the events of September 11, interest in Arabic computational linguistics has risen because large numbers of Arabic documents needed to be scanned, categorized and understood. Human processing of these documents is very costly and time consuming. It is therefore natural for governments and businesses to seek help through automatic processing of Arabic texts, which is more time and cost effective. The characterization of a computationally tractable core grammar of Arabic can be extremely useful in Arabic NLP and Arabic speech recognition and understanding programs. 3.4

Conclusion

In this chapter we propose that an inter-Arabic grammar of Arabic exists in the minds of native Arabic speakers and present a fragment of it. This inter-Arabic grammar represents what is invariant among Arabic varieties. The stability of the Arabic language and its mutual intelligibility among all Arabic varieties are attributed to the existence of this core grammar. Moreover, it has been shown that a description of this grammar can be very useful in teaching Arabic as a foreign language and in developing computational grammars of Arabic.

CHAPTER FOUR

POLYSEMY IN ARABIC DIALECTS Zeinab Ibrahim

Introduction The field of Arabic linguistics is a rich, fertile ground, full of concepts and phenomena that inspire further research. This paper is a presentation of the phenomenon of words and expressions coexisting in more than one Arabic dialect, yet having different meanings in each. This phenomenon is called polysemy, or as Bennett describes it, ‘multiple meaning’ (Makkai et al., 1973: 297). The paper discusses this phenomenon insofar as the researcher’s knowledge permits, using data collected from native speakers from different Arab countries, and their stories of incidents of misunderstanding occurring due to this linguistic phenomenon. The bulk of available research on Arabic dialects deals with the differences and similarities between them, leaving the area of polysemy virtually unresearched. This paper aims at describing the current situation, attempts to analyze the phenomenon within a semantic or historical framework, and calls for collective work to collect all such expressions and lexical items. Lyons sums up the issue saying, “Let us begin by asking what are the criteria that linguists and lexicographers actually apply in coming to the decision that ‘port’ (harbour) and ‘port’ (kind of fortified wine), for example, are distinct, but homonymous, lexemes, but that ‘mouth’ is a simple polysemous lexeme—i.e. one lexeme with several different senses (‘organ of body’, ‘entrance of cave’, etc.)” (Lyons, 1977: 550). He adds that, “Changes of lexical meaning were classified in terms of such notions as broadening, narrowing and metaphorical transfer, on the one hand, and, under the influence of the fast-developing science of psychology, of the acquisition of pejorative or ameliorative associations, on the other; and the laws of semantic change that were proposed did little more than reflect the prior classification of the data. Most conventional dictionaries, it may be observed, whether

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they are said to be constructed on historical principles or not, still operate with such notions as broadening, borrowing and metaphorical transfer in their classification of what are held to be different, but related, meanings of polysemous lexemes.” (ib.: 620) Three semantic factors are considered to be among of the main causes of the phenomenon of polysemy between Arabic dialects. These are broadening, narrowing and metaphorical transfer, according to Lyons (1977). The same factors were classified by Pyles et al. (1970: 225–6), though under different names. Pyles et al. refer to semantic broadening as generalization, semantic narrowing as specialization, and metaphorical transfer as semantic transfer. According to them, “When a sense expands, the change is called generalization because the word has become wider in its range of application . . . The opposite kind of change, in which a word’s sense contracts, is called specialization.” (ib.) As for the third process, he wrote that, “In a shift meaning, the new sense and the old sense do not overlap. Since they do not refer to the same things at all, we cannot say that the meaning has either grown or shrunk, but only that it has undergone semantic transfer.” Considerable literature comparing between different Arabic dialects can be found by researchers such as Mitchell (1978), Cadora (1979), Ferguson (1989), Versteegh (1984) and others; yet, there was only one source (Ayoub, 1968) that discussed polysemy without presenting any empirical research. This paper compiles some lexical items and expressions that were personally experienced or were recounted by other native speakers from different Arab countries. In addition, a number of native speakers of the dialects mentioned in the paper were interviewed in an attempt to collect as many lexical items as possible. This paper will clarify how most of the lexical items discussed came from one word and how meanings then changed through different semantic processes. Examples discussed come from Egyptian, Lebanese, Syrian, Algerian, Moroccan, and Jordanian dialects. Since listing all words and expressions collected from native speakers and personal experience would require more space than is practical, the expressions and words discussed thoroughly are representative of others. A listing of other words and expressions will be found in Appendix “A”. This paper will present several expressions, followed by a number of lexical items as well as attempts to explain of the

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origin of each word or expression. Since no literature is available on the same topic, this paper is only a first step.

Historical Background There are literary examples from pre- and early Islamic periods showing that homonymy, the existence of different meanings for one word, existed in Arabic. Ibn jari (d. 542 A.H.) wrote a dictionary entitled ma-t-tafaqa laf¶uhu wa-x-talafa ma n hu or That Which is Pronounced the Same But Differs in Meaning to explain homonymy. In fact, many Arabic dictionaries serve the same purpose as lexicographers provide lists of the meanings of words. For example, Ibn Jinni (d. 392 A.H.) mentions in his book Al-xaS is ‘The Characteristics’ the several meanings for the word Sad which are ‘the head of the murdered for whom there was no revenge’ ‘echo’ and ‘thirst.’ Al-Xal l (d. 175 A.H.) mentions the several meanings of the word ayn ‘eye,’ ‘water spring’ and ‘tremendous available money’ in his dictionary al- ayn. These are all cases of homonymy, where one word has several, unrelated meanings. Another phenomenon which is characteristic of the Arabic language is the phenomenon of synonyms that are sometimes identical in meaning, but with slight semantic differences between them in other instances. Ibn Jinni (p. 370), Aniis (n.d.: 138), Al-Saalih (1997: 294) and others have discussed this issue. Understanding polysemy, i.e. multiple related meanings, requires a step further in investigating the historical sequence of meanings of a word and determining if they are from the same origin. An example of polysemy in English is the case of ‘mouth’ meaning either an entrance to a cave or body organ. Old Arab grammarians, such as Sibawayh and Ibn Faris did discuss homonymy, but it was Ibn Dirstuwyih who distinguished between homonymy and Polysemy at a time when most grammarians considered polysemous words as metaphors (Omar, 1992: 156). However, Omar quotes Al-Suyuti’s definition: “If the two meanings were distributed [used] in two dialects, or both meanings were used in one dialect. The first instance is like the word /sar aan/ which means ‘lion’ in the Huthayil dialect and ‘wolf ’ for the rest of the Arabs . . .” (Omar, 1992: 159). This same phenomenon exists in the present.

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Thus, Old Arab grammarians did discuss this phenomenon; however, it has not been investigated further in recent linguistic studies.

This Paper Ayoub (1968: 24–25) argues that, “There is no doubt that the Arabic spoken by an Arab in a specific place differs from that spoken by another Arab in a different place. These differences may increase to the point that difficulty in understanding will occur. They also may decrease to the point that only a feeling of either awkwardness/ peculiarity of the language used will occur, or a feeling of using the language incorrectly. An Egyptian traveling to Iraq, Yemen or Tunisia for the first time will find tremendous difficulty in communicating. If an Egyptian travels to Syria or Jordan, the problem will not be one of communication, but rather one of strange expressions that might cause misunderstanding. “An Iraqi saying ala keifak does not mean what an Egyptian will understand. In Iraq it means ‘slow down;’ in Egypt it means ‘do as you like.’ When a Syrian says ana fere t f k , to an Egyptian it might anger him/her because in Egypt it means ‘I rejoice in your misfortune’ while the Syrian meant ‘I am happy for you.’ However, despite these differences in expressions or understanding, we have to admit that whatever expressions Iraqis, Syrians or Algerians use, it is correct Arabic, exactly like that used by Egyptians, Yemenis or Sudanese.” (Translation mine) Actually, Ayoub’s words are very expressive of the aim of this paper. The phenomenon of polysemy will be illustrated in this paper by presenting five expressions and more than twenty words from different Arabic dialects. The paper will trace the historical meanings of the words mentioned and then speculate on the semantic processes that took place and that led to the difference in meanings. Lyons (1977: 569) wrote, “polysemy . . . like absolute homonymy (if we admit its existence), produces purely lexical ambiguities.” Three dictionaries are used to trace the historical changes in meaning related to the expressions and words discussed in this paper. The first is al- ayn by Al-Xal l (d. 175 A.H.) and is considered the oldest Arabic dictionary in existence. The second dictionary, which was written in the fourteenth century A.D., is lis n al- arab by Ibn Man¶ r (630–711 Hijra). The third dictionary is A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic by Hans Wehr.

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Lexical Expressions The following section focuses on how the same expressions are understood differently by speakers of different Arabic dialects due to the three semantic processes mentioned above. The aim of this section is not pragmatic in the sense that it does not investigate the meanings and histories of word clusters, but rather compares the semantic processes involved in various Arabic dialects. The question esh tk n enta in the Algerian dialect means simply ‘who are you?’ while in the Egyptian dialect it means ‘who do you think you are?’ and is definitely an insult. The Modern Standard Arabic man tak n anta has the Egyptian meaning. This can be explained as semantic narrowing in the Algerian dialectal level, where this question changed from a rhetorical question challenging one’s status to a simple request that one identify oneself. To Moroccans, the expression allah yir amhum ‘God have mercy on them’ is said in honor of parents whether alive or dead. To Egyptians, it is only said about a deceased person. In Islamic belief, the Moroccan usage is correct; therefore, this can be seen as another case of semantic narrowing on the Egyptian side, regarding the usage of ra ma ‘mercy.’ The Lebanese use the expression sal mit albak to ask the question ‘What’s wrong with you? Hope you are fine?’. The literal translation of this phrase is ‘I hope your heart is fine,’ but it is used figuratively. Egyptians use this expression in the literal sense only, as alb literally means ‘heart’ (in MSA it is qalb but in most dialects the sound q is pronounced as , a glottal stop). The Lebanese idea is probably that the heart is the most important organ and therefore the word ‘heart’ is used even if the person is ill due to some other reason. For the Lebanese, this is a case of semantic broadening where the meaning of the whole expression, including a reference to the heart, was broadened to refer to one’s general health situation. In the Egyptian dialect, part of the phrase (the word salamtak, literally meaning ‘your (m.s.) safety’) is used to mean ‘what’s wrong with you’ or ‘hope you are fine’. The last two expressions are from the Lebanese dialect and are clear cases of metaphorical or semantic transfer: wa law and ala albak wa law in Syrian means ‘you just name it’, or ‘just ask.’ In Egyptian Arabic, it means ‘never ever.’ law , according to Wehr (p. 881), means ‘even if.’ The Syrian meaning of wa law seems to come from the unspoken phrase ‘even if you ask the impossible,

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I would do it for you.’ As for the Egyptian usage, it seems to come from the unspoken, ‘even if you would do the impossible, I’ll never do that.’ This is a case where the meaning was similar, but a transfer happened with time. A similar case exists in the following expression. A common expression in Lebanon when one sees another eating is Sa atein meaning ‘in health’ and the answer is usually ala albak , meaning ‘and for you as well!’ or ‘may you enjoy it in good health.’ The expression ala albak actually means ‘on your heart,’ and in Egypt it is used in situations when one wants to say that he/she will stay and give the other person a hard time. It is usually part of a larger phrase a id ala albak which literally means ‘I am sitting/staying on your heart’ and socially means ‘I will not leave you alone.’ It can be seen from both expressions sal mit albak and ala albak that the Lebanese view the heart as the symbol of health. As Owens (2002) noted, in Nigerian Arabic the word b t (in MSA bayt) stands for ‘family;’ for example, ween b tak literally means, ‘where is your house?’ and socially means ‘how is your family?’. Thus, an object, place or body organ may represent a state of being or a person, etc. Thus, All meanings of these expressions are correct. It is semantic narrowing, broadening, or metaphorical and semantic transfer that leads differences in meaning.

Lexical Items Twenty lexical items are discussed in this section, including nouns in the singular and plural forms, active participles, and verbs. Cases of metaphorical and semantic transfer, narrowing and broadening will be illustrated in addition to some dialectal and phonological processes. Metaphorical Transfer/Semantic Transfer There are numerous examples of metaphorical/semantic transfer to be found in food nouns. For example makd s in Syria is a kind of pickle while in Palestine it is a dish, both are made of eggplant but differ in preparation. The confusion between muluxiyy and bamiya is endless, as well as that between fa ulya and lubiya . muluxiyya is a green soup to Egyptians and

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bamiya is okra. The situation is reversed in Morocco, so an Egyptian in Morocco or a Moroccan in Egypt has to ask for the opposite of what they want. In Lebanon, lubiya is ‘black-eyed peas’ while fa ulya is a kind a ‘cowpea’ (Wehr 1980: 882 & 692). The opposite is the case in Egypt. These examples are either cases of metaphorical transfer or a simple switch whereby the names of the food items were switched by the time the food item reached another geographical destination. None of these food names were found in the dictionaries of AlXal l, Ibn Man¶ r, Wehr, or Badawi et al. lubiya was found among many other food items in a later dictionary, The Book of Arabized Words in Alphabetical Order by Al-Jaw l qi (1073–1148 A.D.). Ibn al- a raabi, as quoted in AlJaw l qi (1867: 134), said that, “the lubiya is masculine and can be lengthened or shortened with/out a final hamza or j m.” However, in a later work on the book of Al-Jaw l qi, Arsalaan (1995: 288) has this addition to the previous sentence translated as “and lubiyaaj [which is lubiya as well] is a [different] language and not Arabic.” All the above-mentioned words are most probably Arabized, meaning there might have been a semantic transfer (as they no longer refer to the same food item) or a simple switch between proper names of food items. An example of metaphorical/semantic transfer can be seen with the word Tarash. Both al- ayn) and lis n al- arab list the meaning of the verb Tara a as ‘deaf ’ and that meaning is still used in MSA. Wehr (1980: 557) adds two other meanings to the previous definition of Tara a: ‘to vomit’ and ‘whitewashing’. Egyptians use the verb to mean ‘to vomit’ while the Jordanians use it to mean to ‘paint’. Most probably, both dialectal meanings came in a later era after a metaphorical/semantic transfer occurred. An extended semantic transfer must have taken place with ‘whitewashing’ to include ‘whitening the walls of the house’ or ‘painting’. The word b za is a another case of an Arabized word that went through a process of semantic transfer. It smeans ‘ice cream’ to Jordanians and a primitive kind of alcohol to Egyptians. Wehr (1980: 82) lists it as ‘a beerlike beverage’ and Badawi et al. (1986: 113) states that it is from Turkish and means ‘barley beer’. It is not listed in al- ayn or lis n al- arab, which indicates that it came into Arabic a later stage. The interesting point is that the meaning of b za in A Standard Swahili-English Dictionary is ‘Nubian liquor’ (1939: 43). Collins

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Dictionary & Thesaurus lists the English word ‘booze’ (1998: 124) as an ‘alcoholic drink’. A simple speculation is that because many Nubians worked in British houses during the British occupation in Egypt (1881–1952), this may explain how the word came into the Nubian language and then went from Nubian to Swahili. The spread from Nubian was to Egyptian colloquial Arabic and Swahili. There was a British occupation in Jordan as well, so most probably the word made its way into the Jordanian dialect, but to mean ‘ice cream.’ Although one item is drink and the other is food, they both belong to a category of items that are either eaten or drunk. Thus the word can be related backwards to the English word. However, a kind of semantic transfer took place at a certain time to cause the difference of reference in the two dialects. In the Syrian dialect laban stands for ‘yogurt’ and Hal b for ‘milk’. Egyptians use zab di for ‘yogurt’ and laban for ‘milk’. laban is mentioned in the Qur an twice (surat mu ammad and surat al-na l ). The word is also mentioned in the Dictionary of al- ayn (VIII:327) ‘ ’ meaning ‘if a tree that has white water, this is its laban.’ lis n al- arab (V:3989) lists many meanings for the word, ‘milk’ being one of them. It also lists (II:957) Hal b as the ‘milked milk’ agreeing with al- ayn (III:237) which lists Hal b as ‘ ’ ‘The Halb, is the Hal b milk, the verb for milking a cow being Halb’. Thus, both words were used for milk. The Dictionary of Egyptian Arabic (1986: 364) lists laban zab di as ‘yogurt,’ a definition that was commonly used in the sixties. Most probably, the word zab di comes from the nearness of the form of yogurt to zibda or ‘butter’. Therefore, Egyptians left laban to mean milk and added the noun zab di for ‘yogurt’. As for the Lebanese, they kept Hal b for ‘milk’ and when ‘yogurt’ came to existence, it was called laban. In the case of the Lebanese, there is a metaphorical/semantic transfer as the original meaning is ‘milked milk’. Semantic Narrowing/Specialization Egyptians use lam na for ‘a lemon’ and burtu na for ‘an orange’. The Lebanese use either laym na or H mi for ‘an orange’. Haw mi , the plural of H mi , means ‘citrus fruits’ in MSA (Wehr: 205). Thus, it applies to ‘oranges,’ ‘lemons,’ ‘sweet lemons,’ ‘tangerines,’ and ‘grape fruit’. The case of using the word H mi for ‘oranges’ represents a semantic narrowing of the word. There is also a case

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of either metaphorical transfer between lemons and oranges, or a simple switching in the Lebanese and Egyptian dialects. In Syria the word rifi tuh means ‘his (female) classmate or friend’. In Egypt, it would mean ‘his mistress’. In MSA, raf q , with the q pronounced as a glottal stop, has two meanings ‘mistress’ and ‘companion’ (Wehr: 351). Thus, Egyptians use one semantically narrowed meaning, while the Syrians use the other less culturally charged definition. The same occurred with words like mara ‘woman’ and its plural nisw n . Both words are used in a derogatory sense in Egypt, while sit and its plural sit t are commonly used. In the Levant, mara and nisw n are used with no derogatory sense. According to Wehr (p. 963), the word for woman is imra a and the plural is nis , nisw n , and niswa . Both Egyptians and Lebanese deleted the glottal stop in imra a to become mara , but in Egypt it holds a derogatory sense. On the same topic, Abu sa d (1987: 375) wrote:

ibn mar al-mara in the language: al mar a (see i l al-man iq by Ibn al-sik t: 90) and their saying: ibn mara ‘the son of a woman’ is said of one who is not well bred and turned out corrupt and useless. The reason behind that is that they saw that a woman by nature is merciful, weak, unable be strict with her son, and ignorant of what is good or bad for him. The man, or father, is the one who can be strong and strict, therefore if a son does not have a father, or uncle, or brother to raise him and be strict with him, the son will not succeed, or because the mother was ignorant. (Translation mine).

According to this philosophy, the meaning of both words seem to have been semantically narrowed in the Egyptian dialect. Another interesting observation regarding nouns pertains to active participles, which seem to have different meanings in various dialects. These differences are either caused by differences in tense such as in the case of the active participle mil or by differences in semantic meaning such as in the case of the word f r a. However, both nouns show instances of semantic narrowing. If you ask a Syrian inta mil eih , the answer will be a list of what he will be doing that day. To an Egyptian, it simply

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means ‘How are you?’ The active participle, mil, to Egyptians refers to a state, while for Syrians it refers to the future tense. Mitchell (1978) dealt in more depth with the use of participles in a comparison between Jordanian and Egyptian Educated Spoken Arabic (ESA). In his article, he showed how the tense of the active participle differs among Egyptians and Jordanians. Extending the same analysis to this paper, one finds that in the previous and following examples, the meaning of the active participles differ according to regions. Furthermore, it seems that semantic narrowing was the cause of these differences. Cases of semantic narrowing in meaning are illustrated in the following examples. It is clear from the examples that one region made a choice, whether consciously or unconsciously, to narrow the meaning of a word. When asked inti xadd ma fein , Egyptians would understand ‘Where do you work as a servant?’ In Egypt xadd ma means ‘a house maid,’ though a la is used more often because xadd ma has a derogatory connotation. In Morocco, the same question would mean ‘Where do you work?’ as the active participle xadd ma simply means ‘working’ which is derived from the verb xadama. Wehr (229) lists the following meanings for xadama, ‘to serve, to work, to have a job.’ Thus, Egyptians narrowed the meaning of the verb xadama to mean only to ‘serve’. If a Moroccan asks inti far a? , this would mean ‘are you free?’ but to an Egyptian it means ‘you are empty,’ and is an insult. Wehr (707) lists the meaning of fara as ‘to be empty, vacant,’ Thus, both usages are correct; yet, again, it seems that Egyptians tend to narrow the meaning. In Morocco, kara means ‘to rent’ while the same verb is used in some parts of Upper Egypt to mean ‘to hire’ in general, and in other parts to mean ‘to hire a killer’. According to Wehr (824) it means ‘. . . III and IV to rent, lease, let, let out, farm out, hire out, V to sleep, . . ., VIII and X to rent, hire, (s. th) to lease, take on lease (s. th), to hire, employ, engage, . . .’. According to A Dictionary of Egyptian Arabic (747), kara means ‘to rent, hire.’ In the Dictionary of al- ayn (V:403) it means the same. Thus, the word is an original Arabic word; yet, there is a clear case of semantic narrowing in those Upper Egyptian dialects where it is used to mean ‘to hire a killer’, whereas the term has been completely dropped in the Cairene dialect. The more important aspect is that this verb does not occur in the Cairene dialect but only in Upper Egypt, a phenomenon

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observed as well with the adjective na a and the verb ayya discussed below. Semantic Broadening A case of semantic broadening exists in the word dada ≤dad which in Jordan means ‘a lady’, and in Egypt means ‘a nanny’. According to Wehr (269) it is a ‘governess, dry nurse, and nurse’. In Jordan, the semantic meaning of the word was broadened to mean ‘a lady’. The verb ayyaT , according to Wehr (662), means ‘to weep, to cry out, to call, to yell’, and ayya aleih , means ‘to weep over someone’, for Egyptians. The Lebanese, however, use it to mean ‘to cry out’, or ‘to call someone’, and in parts of Southern Egypt, it is also used to mean ‘to call someone’. In his al- ayn, Al-Xal l (II:211) wrote: . “/ / is a word used to call upon the drunk, and is used also when one is victorious. If that person does not answer, then it becomes ayya , and if he comes back then it is a a /. (Translation mine). Thus, the original meaning of ayya is to call on someone but in a specific state and only if the first call was not answered. That meaning was broadened in the Lebanese dialect to include calling anyone in general. For Egyptians, a semantic transfer took place where the word is used to mean ‘to weep over someone,’ that person of course being in a bad state. This could most probably be taken from one of the meanings Al-Xal l stated, since one could consider a drunk person to be in a bad state. Cairenes understand the sentence inti na a as ‘you are smart’. Syrians understand it as ‘you are plump’. Wehr (969) lists the following meaning for na a a, : ‘to give sincere advice’. The same meaning is found in lis n al- arab (VI:4438–4439) in addition to other meanings which include ‘to make someone drink’ and ‘to be generous and prosperous.’ In the Egyptian Delta, na a a is used to refer to an increase in weight. Delta natives think of plumpness as a sign of prosperity. Thus, a case of semantic broadening took place when the word n i was used to mean ‘plump’ in the Levantine and Egyptian Delta dialects. However, this usage is not popular among Cairenes. One form VI verb is itla a It is used in the Egyptian dialect when someone is very upset with another, instead of inviting

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that person to ‘sit down,’ tla a is used an insulting way to say the same thing. In Lebanon, it simply means to ‘lie down, rest.’ The root of this verb is laqi a and is defined in Al-Xal l’s dictionary (III:47) as ‘the pregnancy is stable’. This indicates a state of comfort and stability. Therefore, the Lebanese meaning is more closely related to the dictionary meaning, but was broadened to include any state of lying down. In that case, there was semantic broadening on the Lebanese side and semantic narrowing on the Egyptian side.

Polysemy, Dialects and Other Linguistic Features In Egypt, ba a, is used for ‘sweet potatoes’ and ba t is, , for ‘potatoes.’ In the Levant, ba a, , is the word used for ‘potatoes’ and ba a Hilwa, , for ‘sweet potatoes’; Wehr (1980: 63) lists the Egyptian meanings. It seems that the Egyptians borrowed the English word ‘potatoes,’ leaving it in the plural form. With the Egyptian pronunciation, the word became ba is. The name ‘sweet potatoes’, simply eliminating the final s. For Syrians, the s of the plural in ‘potatoes’ was eliminated from the beginning and a literal translation of ‘sweet potatoes’ took place after that. Thus, in this case, translation processes were involved along with phonetic ones. This is an old process known to Arabs, as Al-jawaaliiqii wrote (1867: 5–6)

The chapter of knowing the Arab methodology in using foreign words: Know that they usually boldly change foreign names if they use them. They change letters [meaning sounds] that are not in their alphabet to ones closest to its articulation. They may also change [not only the sound itself but also] the sound following it. Substitution is necessary so as not to introduce foreign sounds into their language. They may change the morphological form of Persian words to forms of the Arabic language. This change can be either by substituting a sound or adding one (Translation mine).

The same can apply to the word d l b. In Syria, d l b means ‘car tire’ while in Egypt it means ‘closet’. According to Wehr (303),

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the two previous meanings are listed under the root d la “to change periodically, take turns, alternate. Form VI . . . to make frequent use (of s. th)”. In lis n al- arab (II:1456) d la means ‘to alternate’. However, in A Dictionary of Egyptian Arabic, it is mentioned that d l b comes from Persian origins and has the following meanings in Egyptian colloquial Arabic “1—cupboard, wardrobe, cabinet . . . 2—any of various wheels (e.g., water-wheel, potter’s-wheel, watch or clock gearwheel) . . . 3—Short instrumental musical form in one key from four to twelve measures in length” (299). Although the dictionary includes the meaning of wheel, this is known on a very limited scale of the professions who use such wheels. In tracing back the word, we find that du:la:b is the name of a village in Persia (Al-Jaw l qi: 289). There seems to be no relationship between the Persian and Arabic meanings, therefore, it might be that the word was borrowed from Persian after which and a case of semantic narrowing occurred on both sides. Present day Egyptians use the word to mean ‘closet’ while Syrians understand it to mean ‘tire’, whereas xiz na is used in Syria to mean ‘closet’.

Conclusion It can be concluded from the above that the phenomenon of polysemy in which one lexical item has different meanings, has existed since the pre-Islamic period and is still common among Arabic dialects. This linguistic phenomenon requires more of attention. It will allow researchers to record the present reality of all dialects, and to compare them rather than studying each one in isolation. This paper draws attention to this phenomenon, and calls for a major collective effort throughout the whole Arab world. This paper has illustrated that polysemy does exist and that it includes nouns (singulars, plurals and active participles) as well as verbs and expressions. It has also demonstrated that there is sometimes only one semantic process involved in the existence of differences in meaning of lexical items, while in others, there were several semantic processes involved. It has also drawn attention to the process of semantic transfer or switching of proper names, especially in food. The naming of the food items was reversed or switched in the case of muluxiyya, , bamiya , lubiya, and faSulya, . An interesting topic for further investigation are those lexical items

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that are found in the dialects of the Egyptian Delta or Upper Egypt and in non-Egyptian Arabic dialects, but do not exist in Cairo, such as in the case of kara, as well as the negation in both Egyptian and Moroccan dialects of verbs using the prefix ma and suffix , in contrast to the rest of the Arabic dialects that do not use a suffix in negation. As was mentioned earlier, this paper is just a gate for further investigation and documentation of a phenomenon that has lasted for centuries in the Arabic language. It is essential that we fully document and trace this interesting but socially problematic phenomenon of polysemy.

CHAPTER FIVE

WEAK VERBS IN ARABIC1 Abdellah Chekayri

Introduction Arabic morphology is built on the concept of roots and templates. Arabic distinguishes between two major classes: three and four consonant roots, both of which can be combined with templates. Each template has grammatical and semantic properties which can combine with the inherent meaning of the root. kataba ‘he wrote’, k tib ‘writer’, maktab ‘office’, kattaba ‘he made some one write’, kit b ‘book’, etc. All these words share the three consonants ktb and the underlying idea of writing. The three letters are stable in different templates. This category is called strong roots because the three letters appear regularly without showing any abnormal behavior. In other words, strong letters do not change and are not subject to elision. Another class of roots, weak roots, is comprised of roots in which one of the radicals, w and y, could be subject to transformation or elision. This class subdivides into two categories; the first shows a glide in either C1,2 C2 or C3. The second is doubly weak and shows glides either in C2 and C3 or either in C1 and C3.3 The purpose of this article is to participate in the debate concerning the structure of weak, deaf, and reduplicated roots. These tri-radical and quadri-radical roots are grouped in this article, according to their basic meanings, into a common compound of two consonants “C1C2”, i.e. etymon.

1 I would like to thank Naceur Amakhmakh and Abderrahim Jamari for their useful suggestions and discussion. 2 C refers to Consonant. In a root such as ktb “to write”, k refers to C1, t to C2, and b to C3. 3 Verbs doubly weak are subdivided into two classes. laf f mafr q ‘assimilate and defective’, e.g. wC1y, and laf f maqr n ‘hollow and defective’, e.g. C1wy. Both classes are not a subject of study in this article.

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The article presents a synthesis of the structure of weak roots. Semantic arguments will be provided, followed by morphological and phonological arguments. These are not only applicable to the Arabic language, but can be generalized to Semitic languages. We intend to show that: 1) Analogy is an over-generator process that generates forms not used in kal m al- arab ‘Tongue of the Arabs’, 2) The relation crossings between forms and their derivation from the same etymon, 3) The semantic loads that bind realizations derived from the etymon, 4) The apophonic system of Classical Arabic, 5) The apophonic origin of glides. Related to the above distinction between strong and weak forms, other issues such as the lexicographic reality of Arabic forms should be taken seriously into consideration. In the second century two major schools were born, Basra and Kufa,4 and linguistic data poems, proverbs, war stories between tribes, etc.) was collected from Bedouins. According to al-say (I: 101), “The aim was to use the condition of authenticity as a basis but not the amount of data collected.” Both in Basra and Kufa, grammarians first started to analyze the data they collected. Lexicographers put nouns and verbs under their appropriate roots according to certain orders. (1) Dictionary order

Dictionary

• Phonetic order • kit b al ayn • Words’ last consonant • Si llu a, • lis n al arab • Section order • almuxaSSiS • Alphabetical order • as s lbal a

Author Al xal l Al jawhariy, b. Man¶u:r b. si:da zamax ariy

797 D. 1003 D. 1311 D. 1066 D. 1154

The combination of a weak root and a template shows abnormal behavior. Based on the comparison between weak and strong roots, Arab Grammarians (AG) defined circumstances under which a glide could persist, be changed, or be deleted; and explained Arabic language structure by setting rules governing its use. AG’s focus was to 4 See Fleisch (1961: 11–15) for details about the analogy according to the school of Bagdad.

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elaborate a homogenous grammar for the Arabic language. They developed concepts to describe/explain certain phenomena by referring to their resemblance to other phenomena. One of the major concepts developed in this context is the concept of qiy s ‘analogy’.

1. The Concept of qiy s ‘Analogy’ Translated into English as analogy, qiy s (‘measurement’) is, according to Versteegh (1997: 47): “a method to explain apparent deviations from the rules in certain phenomena by referring to their resemblance to other phenomena.” This concept is one of the basic instruments used to find similarities between forms. It became an important explanatory principle in theory and was used for induction as well as for formulating general principles in the language. For illustration, AG consider that the phonological representation of forms such as m d ‘promise’ and m z n ‘balance, weight’ are miw d and miwz n, respectively. According to Ibn ma aa , cf. Bohas (1981: 219): “the proof is that they are derived from wa ada ‘to make a promise’ and wazana ‘to weigh’: the verb first radical is w. We would say in the plural maw d and maw z n and in the diminutive, muway id and muwayzin: the y replaced the w because it was not followed by a vowel and preceded by i, and all ws not followed by a vowel and preceded by i turn into y. If we are asked why we put y instead of w rather than leave it as it is, the answer would be simply because this is lighter for the language”. Ibn ma asserts that a speaker must go from a light to a heavy element. All elements are assigned their own place on a scale from light to heavy [a, i, u, y, w, consonants]. In the case of phonological elements, these terms refer to the degree of sonority; cf. Bohas (1981: 207) and Versteegh, (1997: 46–8). The AG’s concern was to understand Arab linguistic competence by explaining how all forms respond to the same template criteria, i.e. analogy. Still, the main questions are: to which extent does the analogy principle represent reality in itself, or does it reflect any reality? Is analogy a descriptive or explanatory instrument? Does this concept have any impact on processing the language in the Arab’s mind? Does analogy make learners avoid la n ‘language mistakes’? Our main concern in this paper is to find out if analogy could be of any help in understanding glide behavior in Arabic defective

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verbal conjugation. Does analogy help us understand the relationship between the phonetic realization and the underlying level? Does analogy explain why defective verb classes (assimilated, hollow, and defective verbs) behave abnormally? Another issue we would like to raise here is related to phonological vs. phonetic representations. According to analogy, hollow and strong verbal phonological representations are subject to analogy. (2) Phonetic representation katab tu katab a qul tu q l a

Phonological representation

Glossary

katab tu katab a qawal tu qawal a

I wrote He wrote I said He said

By considering /qawaltu/ and /qawala/ as phonological forms of [qultu] and [q la], respectively, these forms are both derived from a tri-radical root: qwl. AG used analogy to restore the underlying level and retrieve the tri-radical root. This choice might have a lexicography reality, but does it reflect any linguistic reality? Does w appear in the hollow verb phonological representation? Are nouns and verbs governed by the same rules? Does the restitution of the underlying level serve as an explanation or a descriptive principle? However, we should clarify certain questions. According to Ibn Jinn (ed. 1954: 239), “And, because xaffa ‘to be light’ fa-huwa xaf f ‘he is light’ is the antonym of yaqula ‘to be heavy’ fa-huwa yaq l ‘he is heavy’, it doesn’t necessarily follow that it [i.e. xaffa] is a fa ula as it is the case with yaqula; indeed, there is a hypothesis founded on analogy, whereas xafaftu / axiffu ‘I became light / I become light’ is a fact of use, and the use prevails over analogy.” Accepted usage or sam has here a function that could be compared to the one of a filter whose function is to reject out of the language a set of perfectly correct forms and theoretically generated, but unused lexical items. The idea that underlies this concept is that qiy s is an over-generator process that generates forms not used in kal m al- arab ‘Tongue of the Arabs’; cf. Guillaume (1982: 416). Another issue to be discussed at this point relates to Arabic writing. Arabs tend not to vocalize written texts. Graphically, semi-vowels [w] and [y] could be perceived as consonants or long vowels. Therefore,

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Arabic transcription does not show the difference between a long vowel [ = u] and a glide [w = u], since both are written the same way. It is only when [u] is vocalized that it is perceived as a glide, if not, it is interpreted as a long vowel. Consider the following: (3) • • • •

q la s ra ma da

he he he he

said left went, departed invited

According to AG, q la, s ra, ma a, and da , are derived from qawala, sayara, ma aya, and da awa, respectively, as defended by analogy developed by AG. At the phonetic level, q la, s ra, ma a, da , etc. have each two consonants [ql, sr, m , d ], respectively, and a long vowel [ ]. At the phonological level, there is no strong reason to believe that q la, s ra, ma , and da , are derived from qawala, sayara, ma aya, and da awa, respectively. Postulating the existence of a glide in the phonological representations will mislead us in different ways. Compare the following paradigms: (4) root qwl syr my dw

Pf 5 active [ ] q la s ra ma aytu da awtu

pf passive // qawala sayara ma aytu da awtu

[ ] qìla s ra mu iya du iya

// Quwila Suyira Mu iya Du iwa

The passive form is derived from the template C1uC2iC3. Whatever the nature of the glide in the phonological representation is, *[quwila], *[du iwa], the sequence [uwi] or [iwa] will appear as [ ] or as [iya], i.e. [qìla] but not *[quwila]; [du iya] but not *[du iwa]. According to AG, many rules should take place in order to have the correct output. In other words, the pf active form [da awtu] and the pf passive form [du iya] are derived from the same root d w. To retrieve an appropriate root for a given form, AG give as many rules as needed to reach the output form.

5

In this article, “pf ” refers to perfective, and “ipf ” to imperfective forms.

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In order to describe the Arabic lexicon, it is best gather the maximum data, as thus we’ll have a better chance to understand the organization of the lexicon and Arabic grammar, as well as principles which govern their organization. This could have implications on Semitic and Chamitic languages diachronic studies. The vision in this paper is not to sacrifice data at the cost of theory. In other words, most theories are concerned with proving their validity, a choice that pushes them to systematically neglect data which doesn’t fit analysis. If one bases one’s study on metrical and grammatical structures, one risks going beyond the main object of studying poems and language; cf. Bohas et Qadiri (1998: 298–9). The main objective here is to accommodate theory to data.

2. Root vs. Etymon Many Arabic dictionaries arrange their roots in alphabetical order. The inconvenience of this ordering is that it does not express a certain number of relation crossings. 1. 2. 3. 4.

To surprise someone, to keep someone. To throw oneself with fury against someone. To throw oneself with fury against someone. To set traps to someone and to make him fall in a misfortune. 5. Sal (Slw) : To wound someone. 6. wasala (wSl) : F. V, tawaSSala: to win, to corrupt someone. 7. SalSala (SlSl) : To sound, to keep. Salla (Sll) S la (Swl) S la (Syl) Sal (Sly)

: : : :

From the standpoint of tri-radical and quadri-radical roots, these forms are not linked. All dictionaries have different entries, but, the seven verbal forms suggest: 1) A semantic relationship 2) The existence of a formal common denominator 3) The presence of glides or reduplicated parts of the root It is obvious that Sl is common to the seven roots; the meaning also appears under a common semantic chain. Thus, the semantic structure regularity between these forms, Salla, S la, Sal , etc., must be brought back to their most abstract root, i.e. etymon, that is the basis from which all morphological operations take place:

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To surprise.  To set traps  to keep someone.  To throw oneself on someone.  To wound.  To win. The starting point of all semantic chains is ‘to surprise someone’, and the organization of the semantic load bound to this phonetic matter is as follows: 1. Generalization / restriction – To surprise someone, and from there: – To throw oneself on someone. 2. Reason / effect – To set traps, and from there: – To keep someone. These semantic links lead to a group of meanings that have as basic the idea of ‘to surprise, to set traps, to throw oneself on someone’, and from there: 3. Consequence 1: – To wound someone. 4. Immediate consequence of ‘to wound’ is: – To win. This polysemy leads to a situation where the extension of sets of neighboring terms can go on, always incorporating more subsystems.

3. Semantic Load This section is limited to the Arabic language. An extensive summary of realizations of etymons has been done in Chekayri (1994). We stripped Kazimirski’s dictionary systematically to clear the semantic loads that bind realizations derived from the etymon by the known processes indicated. Our results were as follows: 349 etymons from which 1310 roots that distribute in the following manner are derived:

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1. Etymons with Six Realizations: 20 Etymons from Which 120 Roots are Derived We distinguish inside this group the following realizations: – With only one semantic load (SL) – With two semantic loads – With three semantic loads – With four semantic loads – With five semantic loads

: 2 etymons from are derived : 7 etymons from are derived : 4 etymons from are derived : 5 etymons from are derived : 2 etymons from are derived

which 12 roots which 42 roots which 24 roots which 30 roots which 12 roots

Examples: 1. One semantic load Sl: see the meanings of the forms derived from the etymon Sl above 2. Two semantic loads r: ra a, r a (r , rw ) : To calm themselves. ra , wara ,(r y, wr ) : To fear. ra , r a, (r w, ry ) : To fear. SL1: to calm themselves. SL2: to fear. 2. Etymons with Five Realizations: 99 Etymons from Which 495 Roots are Derived – With one semantic load – With two semantic loads – With three semantic loads – With four semantic loads – With five semantic loads

: 26 etymons from are derived : 38 etymons from are derived : 25 etymons from are derived : 8 etymons from are derived : 2 etymons from are derived

which 130 roots which 190 roots which 125 roots which 40 roots which 10 roots

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Examples: 1. One semantic load b : ba a (b ) : IV. aba a: to become fat. ba a, ba iya, (b w, b y) : To be fleshy. ba aw, (b w) : To get fat. SL1: to get fat to become fat fleshy being. 2. Two semantic loads b: bawa , b , (bw , by ) : To fall in misery. waba (wb ) : To make unhappy and worthy of mercy or contempt the fate of someone. ba a (b ) : ba a(t): Bottle in copper. b iyya (b y) : Crock. SL1: Misery. SL2: Crock or bottle. 3. Etymons with Four Realizations: 120 Etymons from Which 480 Roots are Derived – With one semantic load – With two semantic loads – With three semantic loads – With four semantic loads

: 41 etymons from which 164 are derived : 58 etymons from which 232 are derived : 16 etymons from which 64 are derived : 05 etymons from which 20 are derived

roots roots roots roots

Examples: 1. One semantic load bz: bazza (bzz) : To carry away, to defeat. bazaw, baziya, (bzw, bzy) : IV. abazza: to defeat, to submit. bayaz (byz) : To perish. SL1: to defeat/to submit/to perish. 2. Two semantic loads mq: maqqa (mqq) : VIII. mtaqqa: to pull all the milk that was in his/her mother’s udder.

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74 maq (mqw) maq (mqy) wamiqa (wmq) SL1: to suckle,

: : : to

To suckle with violence. To keep, to watch over something. To like someone with a big tenderness. like. SL2: to keep.

4. Etymons with Three Realizations: 34 Etymons from Which 102 Roots are Derived – With only one semantic load – With two semantic loads – With three semantic loads

: 4 etymons from which 12 roots are derived : 22 etymos from which 66 roots are derived : 8 etymons from which 24 roots are derived

Examples: 1. One semantic load bk: bak (bky) : To fight tears with someone. b ka (bwk) : To be in trouble and in agitation. bakka (bkk) : To be hurried. SL1: State of the one that is in trouble. 2. Two semantic loads b ¶: ba ¶ ¶ a (b ¶ ¶) : To be old, worn-out and dirty. ba ¶ uwa (b ¶ w) : To hold some obscene subjects. ba ¶ iyy (b ¶ y) : Obscene in his subjects. SL1: obscene subjects. SL2: to be used and dirty. 5. Etymons with Two Realizations: 37 Etymons from Which 74 Roots are Derived – With only one semantic load – With two semantic loads Examples: 1. One semantic load Sh: Saha:, Sahiya, (shw, shy) SL1: Injury.

: 21 etymons from which 42 roots are derived : 16 etymons from which 32 roots are derived

: To have an injury.

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2. Two semantic loads ts: tas (tsy) : III. t s : to hurt someone. t sa (tys) : II. tayyasa : to raise and to make docile (a horse). SL1: to hurt someone. SL2 : to train a horse. 6. Etymons with Only One Realization: 39 Etymons from Which 39 Roots are Derived Examples: xj xajaj (xjj)

: To cohabit with a woman.

We summarize the quantitative results above in the following histogram: 1400 1200 1000 800 600 400 200 0

Etymon Root

Etymon

Root

Thus, we indicate the lexical entries of Arabic of the deficient, deaf and reduplicated verb lexicon to more than 2/3. This undoubtedly represents a large economy for Arabic lexicon. This work finds its support in phonology, in morphology and in semantics and aims to remove redundant elements from the Arabic language roots: semivowels, geminated, and reduplicated elements.6

6 Cf. Bohas and Chekayri (1991) and (1993), Chekayri (1990), (93), (1994c), (1995b), and Chekayri and Scheer (1994), (1996), and (1998).

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76 (5) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

wC1C2 yC1C2 C1wC2 C1yC2 C1C2w C1C2y C1C2C2 C1C2C1 C1C2C1C2

        

C1C2

In sum, recourse to the semantic relations between these lexical entries allows us to establish a tie between those that are articulated around the ‘pivot’ root. This process, that is determined synchronically, finds its strength in morphological and phonological arguments. The derivational criteria from the etymon are not of the same order. There are relations that arise, on a spreading process of a radical, i.e. madad, or of a total or partial reduplication process, i.e. qaliq or qalqal, respectively. On the other hand, other relations settle by a process of apophonic creation in order to satisfy the template, i.e. wajad, yasar, xawf, sayr, da wa and ramya (see section 5). According to this new synthetic view of deficient, deaf and reduplicated roots, these do not have independent entries. Indeed, the criterion of lexical entries’ individuality, i.e. weak roots, shows their failure, because: 1. Defective verbs are not irregular class of verbs 2. Defective verbs must be subject to morpho-phonological rules to be considered tri-radical 3. All defective verbs are governed by phonological constraints From these three observations, it is clear that deficient verbs deserve a treatment diametrically opposed to the treatment of Strong verbs, because phonological constraints make of the deficient roots a class that integrates abnormally within the tri-radical system. In other words, when a class of verbs is placed in a different one, it manifests irregularities. Our vision here must bring a new approach to the defective verbal analysis. In other words, placing this class of verbs in a tri-radical root class and not in its bi-radical root class, means that these verbs will show abnormal behavior. Considering defective roots as tri-consonantal, we must believe, as AG did, that glides must be truncated in the pf, ipf, and impera-

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tive of hollow verbs, in many pf, ipf, and imperative of defective verbs, and in many ipf and imperative assimilate verbs. We believe that AG’s theory and most of the generative analysis of defective verb conjugations need to be strongly reconsidered in the light of highest percentage of glide elision; cf. Chekayri (2001) and Chekayri and Scheer (1998). In our view, the lexicon provides two consonants, a lexical vowel (Vlex) and a three consonantal position template that is ready for identification. The weak verb typology could be summarized as follows: (6) a – Defective verbs : C1 C2 φ + Vlex b – Hollow verbs : C1 φ C2 + Vlex c – Assimilated verbs : φ C1 C2 + Vlex

4. Apophonic System of Classical Arabic Guerssel & Lowenstamm (1996) argue that the apohponic system of Classical Arabic is driven by a very simple derivational mechanism which is represented as follows. (7) Apophonic Path ø ==> I ==> A ==> U ==> U Guerssel & Lowenstamm (1996) argue that all four configurations are connected by apophonic derivations of the following kind. (8) active pf

passive pf

C1 A C2 Vlex C3

active ipf

y a—C1 ø C2 V C3

C1 U C2 I C3

passive ipf

y u—C1 ø C2 A C3

Ipf V2 is derived from its pf pendant by taking one step on the Apophonic Path. labisa, kataba, kabura, ‘to wear’, ‘to write’, ‘to become great’, the ipf forms ya-lbasu, ya-ktubu and ya-kburu are straightforward. For the Daraba ‘to beat’ class, V2 is assumed to be underlyingly zero, so that the apophonic derivation yields [i], i.e. ya-Dribu.7 Consider first the derivation of a sound verb like kataba → ya-ktubu. 7

See Guerssel & Lowenstamm (1996) for more discussion, which we cannot

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(9) pf. kataba ‘write’ C V C V C V C V

ipf. ya-ktubu C V C V C V C V

k

y

a

t

a

b

a

a

k

t

u

b

u

apophony (10) pf. Daraba ‘hit’ C V C V C V C V D

r

∅

b

a

ipf. ya-Dribu C V C V C V C V y

a

D

r

i

b

u

– + spread a apophony The Vlex a does not yield u because of the guttural, velar [ , , h or ] or the fricative uvular [x or g]. These last two consonants behave like a guttural. They block the vowel a to follow the apophonic path: (11) Perfective walah waqac Walag

imperfective ya-lah ya- qac ya- lag

Glossary To lose one’s head To fall down To lick

AG noticed the impact of the guttural on the vowel a8 and generalized the idea that the presence of a guttural in C1 or in C2 blocks the apophony in general. AG explained why the apophony is blocked at the pf by referring to the influence of the guttural in the neighboring vowel, i.e. a. The Theory of Elements (Kaye, Lowenstamm, & Vergnaud (1990) and Scheer (1996)) brought, in addition to the observation, an explanation of the fact that this vowel doesn’t alternate at the imperfective.

reproduce here. For full argumentation regarding apophonic glide-creation, see Chekayri & Scheer (1996, 1998, forthcoming). 8 E.g. Chakir (1997) concerning the impact of gutturals on the distribution of the central vowel in Moroccan Arabic templates.

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Following Scheer (1996: 213–4), one considers that the element A contributes strongly in the ATR, i.e. guttural: (12) U A

A

v

v

h

[g, x]

A

A

h

h

h

[ , ]

[h]

[]

One concludes from this diagram the following observations: 1. Uvulars [g, x] and pharyngeals [ , ] have the same head v. 2. Uvular [g, x] have in their matrix, in addition of the vowel A, the vowel U. 3. Uvular [g, x] have the vowel inflected by the U head 4. Glottals [h] and [ ] have A as a governor. Therefore, the presence of the guttural in first or second radical injects its vocalic element A to reinforce the presence of the Vlex a. The apophonic path is activated and the apophonized vowel comes into contact with another competitor, the one exiting in the guttural matrix, i.e. A. The latter seeks a vocalic position. The preponderance is in favor of the guttural vowel A. This process only applies when the Vlex is a true a. In this class, the apophony does not fail, but, rather it is the guttural that suggests that the apophonic path is blocked, i.e. [wahab] → [yahab]. We first showed the theoretical advantage in considering a fourth vowel ∅ that surfaces like [a]. To substantiate our argument, we used 73 verbs out of 200 where one of the root consonants is a guttural. This considerable number of cases refutes the idea that a surface [a] that alternates with [i] in the ipf form, is a true a. In other words, taking ∅ to be theoretically a short fourth vowel in Arabic explains why gutturals have no influence on apophony : [a] → i :

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80 (13)

C1 or C2 is a guttural

C1 or C2 is not a guttural

Total

a → a a → u ∅ → i

38 — 73

— 05 —

38 05 73

Total

111

05

116

We therefore understand why: – ∅ is nothing but a false [a], – The impact of the guttural in C1 or C2 position is neutralized when the Vlex is ∅. – Guttural, in C1 or C2 position, injects A in the position of apophonized vowel. This procedure applies when the Vlex is a true a. – The apophonic creation of a semi-vowel is operationnal when the apophonic path is blocked and there is no guttural in C1 or C2 position.

5. Apophonic Origin of Glides The distribution of glides in defective verbs is as follows. (14) V2 a i u Total

Number of verbs with w y

example pf

ipf

230

danawa ramaya Sadiya saruwa

ya-dnuwu ya-rmiyu ya-Sdayu ya-sruwu

— 13

118 132 —

‘to ‘to ‘to ‘to

be close’ throw’ be very thirsty’ be distinguished’

493

Since verbs with V2 = [a] admit both [y] and [w] in numerically significant proportions, it does not seem possible to predict the glide from the second vowel of the stem. However, the situation becomes clearer when one observes that the distribution of the glide for V2 = [a] is exactly parallel to that of V2, not in perfective, but in ipf forms.

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Indeed, for verbs with pf V2 = [a], only those that exhibit a [y] show an [i] in ipf V2, and only the verbs whose glide is [w] present [u] in ipf V2. Hence, the glide is predictable for all defective verbs on the basis of the ipf value of V2. Distributionally, the glide thus obeys the same regularity as the derivation of the ipf V2 from its pf input. If there is a way to understand the latter, the former falls out naturally. If ipf V2 is the result of an apophonic derivation on pf V2, it follows that the glide in defective verbs has the same origin and is derived by the same apophonic means. One consequence of this insight is that weak verbs must be biliterals: if the glide is created through apophony in the course of a derivation, it must be absent from the lexicon. In this case, the question arises why glides are created. Chekayri & Scheer (1996) have examined assimilated verbs (glide in C1) with respect to this issue (see also Chekayri 1999 and 2001). When we derive ipf forms of this class of verbs, the glide, which appears in the pf, is always absent. 9 If, following Guerssel & Lowenstamm, the existence of a derivational syllable is assumed, this fact is a natural consequence of the Template Satisfaction Principle (see McCarthy, 1979). The derivational syllable is underscored in the following figures. It may be accessed in derived forms if a derivation has produced segmental material that can not be otherwise accommodated. Consider first the derivation of a sound verb like kataba → ya-ktubu. (15) pf. kataba ‘write’ C V C V C V C V

ipf. ya-ktubu C V C V C V C V

k

y

a

t

a

b

a

a

k

t

u

b

u

apophony In pf forms, the lexicon provides three consonants facing three consonantal positions that are ready for identification. In ipf forms on the other hand, four consonants seek association, (i.e. three consonants provided by the lexicon and the prefixal [y]). In this case, the derivational syllable is accessed in order to host all four consonants. Now consider the situation of assimilated verbs as in (16). 9

This holds true for verbs with V2 = [a] only.

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(16) pf. wazan ‘to weigh out’ apophony C V C w a

ipf. ya-zin

V C V C V z

ø

n

a

C V C V C V C V y

a

z

i

n

u

apophony This time, the lexicon provides only two consonants, ∅zn, which face three skeletal positions in pf forms. In order to meet the Template Satisfaction Principle, a third consonant, [w], is created by way of apophony. In ipf forms on the other hand, three consonants (∅zn plus the prefixal [y]) are linked to three consonantal positions. Since this derivation does not produce a number of consonants that exceeds the basic template, there is no need for the derivational syllable to be accessed.

6. Conclusion In the preceding sections, we have established generalizations regarding the appearance of glides in the conjugation of defective verbs in Classical Arabic measure I forms. In contrast to traditional treatments, the mechanism at work may be reduced to three simple processes; concatenation, apophonic glide-creation, and spreading, which are ‘hierarchised’. The selection of one instead of another is driven by the fact that morphology or phonology produce sequences that are unattested in the language. The clear picture that appears thus may only be arrived at if a certain number of assumptions are made. In particular, the problem may be understood only if defective verbs are regarded as biliterals, the glide being absent from the lexicon. It comes into being by way of apophony upon request stemming from the Template Satisfaction Principle. The behavior of glides also remains chaotic unless a distinction is made between apophonically created semi-vowels and those instantiating a suffixal vowel. At this level, the lexicon is too abstract to be the start point for any morphological and phonological derivation (Bohas, 1997: 193). However, verbal morphology and phonology are organized on the basis of a template constituted of a three consonant positions, and

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flexional (fl), and lexical (lex) vowel positions, i.e. C1VflC2VlexC3. The Vfl represents the active vs. passive voices. When the template is not satisfied, the Vlex will be, in defective verbs, the apophonic origin of glides. Lexicon: Morphology: Phonology:

Radical = 2 consonants + Vlex Template = 3 consonant and 2 vowel positions Template satisfaction: Glide creation from the Vlex

The organization of both morphology-phonology and lexicon is not split clearly, making the relationship between defective verbs less evident. The bi-radical, i.e. (etymon and Vlex ), is too abstract to start any kind of derivation. The tri-radical root, however, is not abstract enough to reflect the semantic relationship within the defective verb class derived from the same etymon.

CHAPTER SIX

TOWARDS A GRAMMAR OF SPOKEN MSA: A CORPUS-BASED APPROACH Sameh Al-Ansary

1. Introduction Resources and practices in the teaching of languages typically reflect the division between empirical and rationalist approaches. Many textbooks contain only invented examples and their descriptions are based apparently on intuitions; other books such as books produced by the Collins COBUILD project—are explicitly empirical and rely on corpora or other sources of real life language data for their examples and descriptions. Corpus examples are important in language learning as they expose students to kinds of sentences and vocabulary which they will encounter in the reading genuine texts in the language or in using the language in real communicative situations (Higgins and Johns 1984). However, corpora, much more so than other sources of empirical data, have important role in language pedagogy which goes beyond simply providing more realistic examples of language usage. A number of scholars have used corpus data to look critically at existing language teaching materials. Kennedy (1987a & 1987b) has looked at ways of expressing quantification and frequency in English as a Second Language (ESL) textbooks. Holmes (1988) has examined ways of expressing doubt and certainty in ESL textbooks. One further application of corpora in language teaching is the use of a computer program based upon a parsed corpus database in building and teaching grammar at the university of Nijmegen (Van Haltren 1994). Recent work at Lancaster university has also been looking at the role of corpus-based computer software for teaching undergraduates the rudiments of grammatical analysis (McEnery and Wilson 1993). Our main focus in this paper is to highlight the usage of an analyzed corpus in building a grammar of a given language. There are

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few trials in this respect, most of which are applied on English (Leech et al. 1985). Biber et al. (1999) has lead an international team of authors towards a large-scale corpus-based grammar of English. This contribution breaks new ground in the detail of its quantitative and functional analysis of grammar across a range of written and spoken varieties of English. In our contribution in this paper, we are presenting an approach towards building a grammar of Spoken Modern Standard Arabic (SMSA) by compiling a corpus and analyzing it automatically.

2. Corpus Compilation Corpus linguistics is a branch of descriptive and computational linguistics which studies language structure and language use (Biber 1988 & 1998). This includes all varieties, media and registers of language. The reason why we have chosen the corpus based approach for our research in comparing spoken and written MSA is reasonable for the nature of the MSA itself since there is no other way to study it because there is no speech community of MSA. Actually, native speakers of Arabic use one of the regional colloquial varieties. It is a fact that MSA is learned as a secondary language at school. MSA is used in any written form of communication as well as in any formal speech. We should note that language structure used in written communication may differ a lot from that used in spoken communication. In collecting the corpus, we tried to avoid any subjective interference of native speakers in the texts being studied for the sake of the results (in the sense that the native speaker may care about the way he or she is producing the texts (talks) in a given way). In building the samples of MSA, we were sticking to Badawi (1973) who included radio and TV broadcastings as well as newspapers texts with the MSA level. However, it can be correct that not all radio and TV programs can be included within the scope of MSA that Badawi meant. Therefore we were keen to collect our corpus from clear, direct and uncontroversial sources on one hand and stabilize the choice of the genres on the other. Consequently, the corpus is collected for the formal description as follows. The spoken texts are spontaneous speech and are collected from live spontaneous interviews found in TV news bulletins. The 9 o’clock news bulletin is

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considered to be the primary source of data for this type. Normally such interviews are supposed to be using MSA as a mean of communication and highly educated persons are invited for speech. We have chosen the parts that satisfy our needs i.e. freeing the corpus from any colloquial interferences. The corpus studied consisted of approximately 2200 NPs of spoken of MSA.1 In fact, after the grammar is felt to be adequate, a huge amount of spoken texts could be analyzed automatically leading to linguistic generalizations about spoken structures, consequently guide teaching spoken MSA.

3. Corpus Analysis In this section we are going to introduce the linguistic and formal basis used in building the parsing tool used in analyzing the corpus described above. Other issues related to the level of the analysis, the status of the grammar and the how powerful the parsing tool is will be dealt with. 3.1

The Linguistic and Formal Approaches

In this section we will explain briefly the linguistic and formal framework in which a NP category occurred which represents the core of our parsing tool that can be used efficiently in building a Grammar for SMSA. Regarding the NP linguistically, a number of functions could be distinguished. These functions are: the head, the determiners and the postmodifier. The individual behavior of these functions ranges between determination and postmodification of the nucleus of the NP, the element occurs in the head function. The NP, in its simplest form, only consists of a head. Even in a more or less complicated NP, only one head function is to be distinguished. The principle of mono-headedness will not cause any undesired analysis results of the phrases, especially in cases of coordination, since it is related to the functional level while something like coordination occurs at the categorial level. The head is specified and defined as the unit which 1 This corpus size consists of the initial corpus (560 NPs) used in Al-Ansary (2002) and other extensions added to make more generalizations. However, this size is still under development to get an adequate corpus for linguistic judgements.

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is marked for its function at the next higher level of description and cannot be deleted without affecting the meaning of the constituent (Ditters 1992 and Al-Ansary 2002). By this definition, the head function of an NP can only be realized by the category noun. Owens (1988) distinguished several subcategories which are able to realize this function. According to our subclassification of nouns, a common noun, pronoun, proper noun, present participle, passive participle, adjectival noun, standard infinitive (verbal noun), noun of title . . . etc. are examples of heads of an NP (for more details cf. Al-Ansary (2002) and El-Kareh & Al-Ansary 2000). In extension of the head, an element can function as a determiner to the head of the NP. The element occupying this function may occur before or after the head. This brings us to differentiate between what is called a “predeterminer” (PREDET) and “postdeterminer” (POD). However, it has to be kept in mind that they are mutually exclusive in relation to the head i.e. they could not occur together. The category in the function of predeterminer is mainly the prefixed article “ ” while the category in the function of postdeterminer is a normal NP marked for genitive case. The postmodifier function is always placed after the head of the NP and; is for this reason called “post modifier” (POM). In our approach, post-modification could, according to its categorial realization, be classified into PPOM, ADJPOM, NPOM or ADVPOM, realized by a prepositional phrase, adjective phrase, noun phrase and adverbial phrase respectively. An additional element could be distinguished functioning as a complement of the head of the NP (COMPL). Like postmodification, the complement function is always realized after the head. However, it is not recommended to treat both of them as a postmodification since the complement has a particular syntactic function in relation to the head. For example, a postmodifier follows its head with respect to ‘definiteness’, ‘number’, ‘gender’, and ‘case’. There is no direct relation between the head and its complement as far as agreement is concerned. On the contrary, the head imposes specific values on its complement. Formally, the linguistic description of the NP in MSA can be represented by means of context-free rules. To implement the formal grammar, we used a two level approach for syntactic description by means of the AGFL (affix Grammar over Finite Lattices) formalism. In this way, ROOT is the start symbol in our grammar and ROOT is rewritten in the phrasal category NP. The NP is in its turn rewrit-

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ten as a sequence of optional and obligatory functional elements (which constitutes the first level of description, syntactic level). The description alternates between functions and categories till the description in lexical terms has been reached. Starting with our initial label ROOT, the first rule is: ROOT: NP. A number of restrictions is applied via some linguistic features to determine the dependencies and relations between the elements of the NP (which constitutes the second level of description, affix level). Thus our start label could be revised as: ROOT: NP (definiteness, number, gender, person, and case). By means of the non-terminal affix variables, we are dealing with the elements of the first and second levels of description. At the first level, non-terminal elements are arranged in phrase structure rules called syntax rules or hyper rules. These phrase structure rules care context-free rules describing syntactic structures. As we have seen with ‘definiteness’, number, gender, person and case, other affix variables can be attached to the non-terminal of the first level. These meta affixes constitute the second level of description. Conventions for the writing of affix rules and syntax rules as well as all technical information about AGFL can be found in Koster (1991). 3.2

Level of Analysis

The NP constitutes the core phrase in the Arabic language. It is a matter of fact that even the VP and PP are composed by introducing a verb and a preposition to an NP, respectively. Thus the NP constitutes almost the whole text (discarding verbs and prepositions). Therefore, the NP level has been chosen to be the limited scope of the analysis. This choice was taken because the NP is the most frequently occurring unit in any sentence. By giving a formal description to the NP, a great part of the syntax of the language will be accomplished. It is important at this point to make two important issues clear. First, the NP selected for the study is not the smallest building block of the sentence, as far as nouns are concerned, but it is the unit that is supposed to have one function in the sentence (e.g. subject, object, complement, predicate, etc.). Second, the types of the NP that enter within the scope of the present study are those which appeared within the corpus studied.

90 3.3

chapter six The AGFL (Affix Grammar over Finite Lattices) Formalism

Affix grammars are a family of two-level grammars, where the first level consists of context-free syntax rules, rewriting non-terminals to terminals or to other non-terminals e.g. SENTENCE: SUBJECT, VERB. The second level is a level where affix domains are defined by rewriting affix non-terminals e.g. number: PLURAL: SINGULAR. The two levels can be combined by using affixes as parameters to non-terminals in the syntax rules. Thus, the one-level grammar can be extended with affixes as parameters e.g. SENTENCE: SUBJECT (number), VERB (number). Note that all occurrences of the same affix within one rule have the same value. This implies unification about affix values. The affix mechanism is a powerful tool to make the grammar more compact, while at the same time allowing for a linguistically motivated way of description. The AGFL formalism consists of a collection of software systems for Natural Language Processing and grammar development. The grammar workbench enables the user to edit grammars, in order to perform a consistency checks on a grammar, to compute grammar properties, to assist in performing grammar transformations and to generate examples. Affix Grammars over Finite Lattices is a simple form of two-level grammars admitting quite efficient implementations. In this section the concepts and notation of AGFL as well as the different levels of description are described. A brief example is given of their use in describing a fragment of the English language, followed by examples of the applications of AGFL in linguistics.2

4. The Formalized Grammar In this section we are going to describe briefly the broad lines that constitute the grammar used in analyzing the compiled corpus. We will not go into technical orientations of the computational axis. Rather will make the description as informal as possible to enable the non-specialists in computational linguistics to follow the discussions.

2 For more information about AGFL cf. Koster (1996a & b), Krulee (1991), Moritz (1989), Valk Ben (1989). Also you can see http://www.cs.kun.nl/agfl/.

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The Syntax Level

For the description of the NP we want to include the affix3 name ‘subclass’ and to keep record of the realized values for ‘definiteness’, ‘number’, ‘gender’, ‘person’, and ‘case’. Therefore, our first rule will be reformulated as: ROOT: NP (defness,4 subclass, number, gender, person, case).

The affix non-terminal ‘subclass’ will always be instantiated by the subclass of the main HEAD of the NP. This affix is important for keeping track of the subclass of the head of the NP which will have a noticeable role in disambiguating a lot of undesired alternatives by filtering out the subclass of the head depending on the context. A specific value for ‘definiteness’ results from the presence or absence of a pre- (DEF BY PREDET) or postdeterminer (DEF BY POD). An entry may be lexically determined as for example belonging to the subclass of personal pronouns or proper nouns (DEF BY ITSELF). The value of ‘gender’ is exclusively linked with the specific semantic or syntactic realization of the head element. ‘Number’ is an important feature to realize a distinction in singular, dual and plural (both regular and broken) which is crucial for the agreement between subconstituents inside the NP at a lower linguistic level. The affix ‘person’ is needed for the description of structures in which a personal pronoun occurs. All other nouns are THIRD person. A value ‘case’ may result depending on from the function of the elements in the context. Details of how syntactic rules work can be found in AlAnsary (2002). 4.2

The Affix Level (Linguistic Features Level)

In our formal description we like to highlight information about the head realization of the NP. For this reason one of the affix non-terminals used is the ‘subclass’ which has values according to the subclasses of the Arabic noun adopted in this study. Thus the following rule is used:

3 Affix level is the level of adding linguistic features; it is the second level of description and will be dealt with in the next section. 4 For making the name of this feature of definiteness shorter, it is contracted to ‘defness’.

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chapter six subclass::NPGOD;NW;NIA;NIS;NOP;NNC;NNP;NE;NPP;NT;NDS; NIM;NDP;NF;NDJ;NDC;ND;NU;NQTM;NQTUM;NDO;NDE;NNL.

In the left hand we see the non-terminal variable “subclass” is rewritten in terms affix terminals (e.g. God proper noun, relational noun ( ʔism mansoub), artificial verbal noun, Standard verbal noun, etc.). Definiteness is expressed by the following rule: defness::def;INDEF. def::DEF BY PREDET;DEF BY POD;DEF BY ITSELF.

This can be paraphrased as: Definitness in Arabic can be either definite or indefinite, the “def ” is in turn can be definite by predetermination (the definite article “ ”, post determination ( id fa) or by itself (proper noun, pronoun . . . etc.). Other rules that were used to express the gender agreement, number, person, case, humanity and transitivity can be expressed through the following rules respectively. Note that the terminal value “EMPTY” is used when the rule is not applicable. gender::FEM;MASC;BOTH. number::SING;DUAL;PLU. plu::BPLU;RPLU. person::FIRST;SECOND;THIRD. case::GEN;NOM;ACC. humanity::HUMAN;NONHUMAN;GOD. transitivity::INTRAS;MONOTRANS;DITRANS5;EMPTY.

Figure (1) shows a template of a rule in which we see two levels of description. The first level is the syntactic level that is used to for describing optional6 and obligatory elements inside the NP while the second level is the affix level that is used for expressing dependencies, relations and agreement between the elements of the NP.

5 Some verbs in Arabic could be tri-transitive i.e. need 3 objects. However, this feature has not been considered here since no verb from this kind has been faced in the corpus so far. 6 In AGFL, the optional elements are enclosed between square brackets.

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First level of description Left-hand-side NP(definiteness,subclass,gender,number,person,case):Function1(A1,A2,A3), [Function2(A1,A2,A3)], [Function3(A1,A2,A3)].

Second level of description Figure 1. A template of a context-free rule with two levels of description

See the following rule as an application of the template shown is figure (1).7 NP(defness,notndj,number,gender,THIRD,case): NHEAD(notndj,number,gender,THIRD,transitivity,humanity), POD(defness1,number1,gender1,person,GEN), PPOM(defness1,number2,gender2,person2,GEN), [PPOM(defness2,number3,gender3,person3,GEN)].

The rule can be paraphrased as follows: an NP is realized by a nominal head followed by a postdeterminer and then postmodified by one or two prepositional phrases (PPOM). 4.3

The Lexicon

In this section we will present the structure of the lexicon used. In this component of the grammar, a complete listing of the lexical realizations of the categories is involved. However, we will limit ourselves to a few alternatives in this section. Non-terminal categories carrying affix names but not further rewritten in function elements can be rewritten in lexical items since the value of the associated affixes has already been specified in the linguistic features level (see section 5.2 above). This rewriting of the categories in final terms

7

For full details of the grammar cf. Al-Ansary (2002).

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yields true alternatives or realizations which only differs at features level. The lexical rules given for the definition of the noun in our grammar is: NOUN(subclass,number,gender,person,transitivity,humanity).

When the value of ‘subclass’ is defined, a given set of nouns is specified. For example, when the subclass is instantiated as a pronoun (NPRO), only the subclass of pronouns will be defined. The affixes ‘number’, ‘gender’ and ‘person’ will determine which pronoun is needed. The following lexical items are examples for those entries that should be defined by instantiating the affix values: NOUN(NPRO,SING,BOTH,FIRST,HUMAN): NOUN(NPRO,BPLU,BOTH,FIRST,HUMAN): NOUN(NPRO,BPLU,MASC,SECOND,HUMAN): NOUN(NPRO,SING,MASC,SECOND,HUMAN): NOUN(NPRO,SING,FEM,THIRD,humanity): NOUN(NPRO,SING,MASC,THIRD,humanity): NOUN(NPRO,DUAL,MASC,THIRD,humanity): NOUN(NPRO,BPLU,MASC,THIRD,humanity):

. . . . . . . .

Other non-terminals can be rewritten in terminal values as : NOUN(NPH,SING,MASC,THIRD,EMPTY,HUMAN): . NOUN(NPP,SING,FEM,THIRD,EMPTY,NONHUMAN): . NOUN(NNC,SING,MASC,THIRD,EMPTY,HUMAN): . NOUN(NNC,SING,MASC,THIRD,EMPTY,NONHUMAN): . NOUN(NDS,BPLU,MASC,THIRD,MONOTRANS,HUMAN): . NOUN(NDO,SING,FEM,THIRD,MONOTRANS,HUMAN): . NOUN(NDJ,SING,MASC,THIRD,INTRANS,humanity): . NOUN(NIS,SING,FEM,THIRD,MONOTRANS,NONHUMAN): . NOUN(NIS,SING,MASC,THIRD,DITRANS,NONHUMAN): .

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5. The Grammar Status The following are some statistics show the structure of the grammar used in analyzing the spoken corpus, consequently attaining a contemporary NP grammar for spoken MSA: – – – – –

Nr. Nr. Nr. Nr. Nr.

of of of of of

syntax rules: 234 syntax alternatives: 942 options: 45 lexicon rules: 12 terminals: 2862

The number of syntax alternatives represents the alternatives that replaces the right hand side in the syntax rules. For example, if A → B is a syntax rule, then the grammar contains 234 rules in this format and 942 alternatives to the right hand side (i.e. the B). The number of potions represents the number of elements that are enclosed between “( )” which denotes that the syntactic element is optional. Lexicon rules are those rules that are used to represent the 2862 terminals included in the lexicon so far. It is important to prove the adequacy of our grammar to validate the tool built on which the basis for inferring a grammar for spoken MSA from a contemporary corpus of spoken MSA will be based. The word ‘status’ mentioned in the title of this section includes also to use authentic language materials (from the corpus) to verify the adequacy of the description. The analysis of authentic language material certainly constitutes a valid criterion for judging about the correctness of the description. Evaluating the grammar this way helps in assessing the performance and to clarify what still has to be done. Examples of some tree diagrams obtained from the parser could be found in the Appendix. Elaborated in this way, the parser could successfully analyze very complicated NPs and could deal with coordination at different linguistic levels. Accuracy reached 95%.

6. Towards a Corpus-based Grammar for Spoken MSA According to the sample analyzed with the parsing tool (the grammar) described in section 5, the NP in Spoken Modern Standard

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Arabic has assigned the following functional structures together with their frequencies listed in the following table: Spoken NP Structure

Number of tokens

NHEAD NHEAD, POD PREDET, NHEAD PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM NHEAD, ADJPOM NHEAD, PPOM PRE EXTENSION, PREDET, NHEAD PREADDRESS, PREDET, NHEAD NHEAD, POD, PPOM CHEAD, NUMBER COMPLEMENT PREADDRESS, NHEAD PREDET, NHEAD, PPOM PRE EXTENSION, PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM NHEAD, POD, NPOM NHEAD, POD, ADJPOM NHEAD, ADJPOM, ADJPOM CHEAD, POD VOCATIVE INTRODUCTION, NHEAD PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM, ADJPOM PREDET, NHEAD, NPOM SUPERLATIVE NHEAD, POD NHEAD, PPOM, PPOM NHEAD, POD, CONFIRMATION PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM, ADJPOM, ADJPOM PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM, PPOM PREDET, NHEAD, CONFIRMATION NHEAD, ADJPOM, PPOM NHEAD, ADVPOM NHEAD, POD, ADJPOM, PPOM PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM, NPOM PREADDRESS, NHEAD, NPOM NHEAD, POD, PPOM, PPOM PREDET, NHEAD, CONFIRMATION, REFORMULATION PREDET, NHEAD, NUMBER COMPLEMENT NHEAD, POD, ADVPOM PREDET, NHEAD, PHRASAL INSERTION, ADJPOM CHEAD, POD, PPOM NHEAD, NPOM NHEAD, ADJPOM, PPOM, PPOM PREDET, CHEAD, PPOM, NUMBER COMPLEMENT, ADJPOM PRE EXTENSION, PREDET, NHEAD, ADJPOM, PPOM PREDET, CHEAD, PPOM, PPOM

612 456 293 152 100 70 60 42 40 38 30 30 28 25 20 16 15 15 12 12 11 10 9 9 9 9 8 8 8 8 7 6 6 6 5 5 4 4 3 3 2 2

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Structures listed in the table above shows some interesting features. For example, the postmodifier (POM)8 is the most expectable function that may follow the NHEAD. Regarding different types of realizations of postmodifiers, the ADJP comes still first in frequency to modify the NHEAD then the PP then the NP and finally the ADVP. Flexibility is detected for the NP in postmodifying the NHEAD, the NPOM does not seem to have any specific structure connected to it. It can follow the NHEAD, the POD or even the ADJPOM. However, it is a little more frequent when it is preceded by a POD. Statistical information have proved importance in teaching and in linguistic studies. Many studies over the world have been using the statistical approach with a high rate of accuracy. These information like those presented in the table above helps to develop new theories about which rules should be taught before others. In addition, building a grammar from a naturally occurring data gives authenticity and naturalness to the materials on which the teaching activities will be based.

7. Conclusion In this paper, we aimed at: 1. Presenting a powerful strategy for detecting structures of Spoken Modern Standard Arabic (SMSA) according to the actual contemporary use (in the present stage we dealt with NP structures). 2. Describing Modern Standard Arabic structures in a way that leads to automation to be able to analyze huge corpus of spoken MSA formally and objectively. 3. Expressing SMSA structures in terms of frequency (type/token). 4. Building a base infrastructure for Arabic teaching and NLP applications. We almost attained a stepping stone for these aims listed above. Our corpus approach together with parsing this corpus automatically is the strategy that we presented to detect an authentic grammar for spoken MSA instead of the old rules listed in a boring way in old

8

Note that POM here includes ADJPPOM, PPOM, and ADVPOM.

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Arabic Grammar books (it might be true that there is no book presented specifically for Spoken Arabic Grammar). This approach enables to obtain a real view of the frequency of each structure in actual use. Having expressed spoken structures in a way that leads to automation, we can build a base infrastructure for processing and teaching the Arabic language. Consequently we can go towards a real grammar of Spoken MSA by applying this strategy to a higher level of linguistic description, the sentence.

towards a grammar of spoken msa

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APPENDIX: EXAMPLES OF PARSED NP STRUCTURES Example A a - acbu almisriyyu acbu alkan nati alcaÎ mati ‘The Egyptian public, the people of great shelter’

NP

PREDET

NHEAD

ADJPOM

ARTICLE

NOUN

PREDET

ADJHEAD

NNC

ARTICLE

NOUN

NHEAD

NW

NOUN

NNC

PREDET

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Example B taqri:run an gtima t alwuzara wadir satihim liwad i amaliyyati as-sal m ‘A Report about the meetings of the ministries and their studies about the position of the peace process’

NP

NHEAD

PPOM

NOUN

PP

NNC

PHEADER

PCOMPLEMENT

PREP

COORDINATION

NP

COORD

NHEAD

POD

NOUN

NP

NIS

CONJ

PREDET

NHEAD

ARTICLE

NOUN

NP

NHEAD

POD

NOUN

NP

NIS

NHEAD

PHEADER

NOUN

PREP

PART II

LANGUAGE LEARNING

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE GRAMMATICAL TRADITION AND ARABIC LANGUAGE TEACHING: A VIEW FROM HERE Jonathan Owens

It is unthinkable to think of the Arabic grammatical tradition without thinking about the role of Arabic language teaching in it. Indeed, one might well ask whether any grammatical tradition doesn’t, as one of its raison d’etres, presuppose an interest in institutionalized language instruction in some form or another.1 The idea of studying and describing languages in general for their own sake or for the sake of theoretical interest, however, defined, is relatively new, and I might add, if very recent linguistic history is any guide, not a particularly popular one. One has to distinguish, however, between a tradition serving practical, pedagogical needs, and individual works existing within its broad borders. This distinction is particularly relevant in the case of the Arabic gammatical tradition for one remarkable reason, namely that the two most important very early works, Sibawaih’s Kit b and alFarra ’s ma ni al-qur n, are descriptive tour de forces, respectively, a description of Arabic and an elucidation of grammatical and semantic issues in koranic interpretation. Looked at in terms of modern linguistic practice, such an orientation appears banal. However, certainly in comparison to the later Arabic tradition, and probably in comparison to other classical traditions (though I can only judge at second hand here), it represents groundbreaking thinking in language analysis.

1 In the compendious History of the Language Sciences, every major grammatical tradition (Indian, Chinese, Ancient Greek, Medieval, etc.; unfortunately a chapter on the Arabic is missing here) includes at least one chapter on the role of education in the tradition.

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1. It is Relevant to Briefly Consider the Goals, Methodology and Reference Sources of these Two Works Beginning with Sibawaih, Carter (1973) has suggested that, in contrast to later grammarians, Sibawaih’s goals were descriptive rather than prescriptive (to recall a dichotomy popular in linguistics over 2 decades ago). This provides us with a starting point in understanding Sibawaih, though we have to make precise what is understood by descriptive. Sibawaih’s descriptivism was embedded in a dichotomous structure in which linguistic forms were typically associated with two attributes. First, the forms were attached to various sources of reference, poetry, the Koran, expertise of unnamed Arabs, reports about usage among tribal groupings, and reports of other grammarians. The linguistic forms were not, however, innocent linguistic observations. Coming to the second point, beyond being associated with a referential anchor, they were also grounded in an explicatory framework. In the simplest and most frequent case, there is a internal grammatical reason for the variation. The m ahl al-Hij z (I: 21, see (1)), for instance, governs a predicate in the accusative, because it is assimilated to the governance paradigm of the verb laysa (1b). In other cases more than one factor is involved. 1a m abdu ll hi mun aliqan 1b laysa abdu ll hi mun aliqan Describing, for example, the variant - of the 2FSG object suffix, as in inna- i,2 Sibawaih notes that the speakers use these forms, so that in pausal position they may clearly distinguish this form from the 2MSG, -ka (2). 2a 2b

inna- i inna-ka

mun aliqatun (alternative to inna-ki mun aliqatun) mun aliqun

It is clearer, in Sibawaih’s terms, ‘stronger’ to distinguish two morphemes via a consonantal difference ( vs. k) than via a vocalic one (-i vs. -a). Unlike a pure descriptivist, Sibawaih not only describes what is said and observed. He invariably adduces either a grammatical reason and/or a psycho-grammatical context (ease of articulation, motivations of clarity and contrast, etc.) that provides a motivation for the existence of the variants. 2

Attributed to the Tamimi and Bani Assad, II 322.

the grammatical tradition and arabic language teaching 105 Al-Farra , no less than Sibawaih, treats his many variants within a framework of grammatical explications.3 At the very beginning of his Ma niy, for instance, he explains the variants al-Hamda li-ll hi, al-Hamdu lu-llahi and al-Hamd-i li-ll hi (for Q 1.2 al-Hamdu li-ll hi ) in terms either of employment of a verbal noun (maSdar, in later terminology a maf uwl mu laq, 3a) or phonological assimilation, either progressive (3b) or regressive (3c). 3a al-Hamda li-ll hi, 3b al-Hamdu lu-llahi 3c al-Hamd-i li-ll hi The approach of these two founding linguists might be termed “explicatory descriptivism”. It is an approach largely limited to the early era of Arabic grammatical study. Explicatory descriptivism is set off from later approaches in placing minute descriptions of related constructions, often ones formally distinctive but semantically identical (as in the examples cited for both al-Farra and Sibawaih above) cheek by jowl with explanations elucidating, if not justifying the existence of the variants. Later grammar tended to compartmentalize the explication and the descriptivism into different categories, if not different grammatical genres, at an extreme, the descriptive grammars as opposed to the u uwl al-na w. I will expand upon this briefly below. Why explicatory descriptivism should have reigned in the very early era of grammatical codification is a question, if answerable at all, which lies outside the scope of the current presentation. I would mention one point which I consider crucial, and this is that for whatever reason, linguistic norms defining correct Arabic were more broadly conceived than is perhaps appreciated today. Certainly no self-respecting teacher of Arabic today, including myself, would countenance (2a) as correct (Standard or Classical) Arabic. For Sibawaih it was not only acceptable, but logical, indeed, perceptually more logical than (2a). It is worthwhile calling attention to explicatory descriptivism, because it produced a wealth of descriptive detail not only in terms of phonological, morphological and syntactic breadth, but also in terms of linguistic variation. The examples in (1–3) above are a very small sample. 3

Impressionistically, al-Farra is less concerned than Sibawaih with psychological or cognitive motivations.

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Explicatory descriptivism was a remarkable accomplishment for two definitional reasons. First, the explication assumed a sophisticated grammatical system according to which linguistic phenomena could be explained. Secondly, the system set the framework within which a potentially unlimited range of grammatical forms could be described.4 Already in the course of the ninth century there began to develop an avowedly pedagogical approach to the presentation of Arabic grammar.5 Works such as the Muqaddima fi l-Na w attributed to Xalaf al-A mar and, at the other end of the century, the Muwaffaqiy of Ibn Kaysan were consciously short summaries of Arabic grammar. In the introductions to both we meet a recurring theme in the presentation of Arabic grammar, the need to simplify to the bare facts of Arabic. The Muqaddima fi l-Na w is Arabic grammar at its simplest: short chapters, no reflections about why the grammar is at it is, no alternatives to the forms given. In a critique which will be encountered again below, it is claimed that grammarians were too long winded, preoccupied with linguistic causes, and neglected the simple needs of the language learner. The Kit b l-Jumal fiy l-Na w, enigmatic in its authorial attribution but certainly an early work, beyond stressing its concision of grammatical presentation, confirms that the teaching of Arabic has become a marketable product: Whoever knows these forms [of i r b], according to the manner which we described them in our previous summary, may dispense with many of the books on grammar. (33)

4 I would emphasize that the conception of the origins of Arabic grammatical practice advocated here are quite antithetical to those proposed some time ago by Carter (e.g., 1972, 1983). At a number of points (1972, 1983: 76) Carter asserts that Sibawaih’s grammatical practice was basically an application of legal methodology and terminology to linguistic analysis. Carter has never shown in any detail, however, either terminologically or methodologically, how this transference occurred, nor has he entertained (i.e., falsified) the possibility that the direction of influence was in the opposite direction, or that the disciplines developed parallel but largely separately (see Owens 1995). 5 The relation between Arabic grammar and educational imperatives has been treated from a number of perspectives in works such as Versteegh 1977, esp. chapter, 1980, Carter 1985, Suleiman 1999.

the grammatical tradition and arabic language teaching 107 With the beginning of the 4/10th century the era of the pedagogical grammar is here to stay. The material in Ibn al-Sarraj’s al- u uwl fi l-Na w may be reworked, reorganized, even expanded upon, but, arguably, it has never been bettered. An interesting accompaniment of the pedagogical grammar is the canonization, in my interpretation, following Weil 1910, of the Basran and Kufan schools of grammar. I will return to this in section 3 below. The pedagogical orientation in the early phases of the Arabic tradition is evident not only in the appearance of the well-heeled grammar. Numerous shorter treatises were written geared to specific learning problems. To cite but a few of the authors for whom extant works exist, al-Farra wrote about gender, al-Qutrub, al-Farra ’s contemporary, wrote about the contrastive realization of the three short vowels, and Farra’s mentor, Kisa i wrote perhaps the earliest work on common speech erros, the la n al- aw mm. Sijistani, Ibn Sikk t and al-A ma i in the mid ninth century treated the semantic question of al- i d.6 A sure sign that education and grammar had become inextricably linked by the 4th/10th century is their mutual involvement in metatheoretical issues. Zajjaji (iy 95, see also Versteegh 1995: 164), for example, has a chapter in which he links the study of Arabic grammar to an understanding of Arabic culture and Islam. In an earlier chapter ( iy : 64) he discusses the basis of linguistic explanations, how they are inferred, whether they are verifiable and whether necessary or contingent. The triumph of metatheoretical speculation comes, of course, half a century later in the work of Ibn Jinni, in particular his xa i . One point that emerges here is that Arabic grammar is articulated as a discrete and independent object, bounded by related sciences, embedded in and supported by a universal logic of procedures and proofs, but also by its contingent relation to Arabic culture and Islam.7

Al-Farra , al-Mu¶akkar wa l-Mu annay, al-Qu rub, Muyallay t Qu rub, Sijistani, etc. yat Kutub fiy l- i d. 7 Carter (1983) is a bold, but unhappily and flatteringly Machiavellian interpretation of the place of Arabic grammar and grammarians in the Islamic sciences establishment. He writes (p. 66) “. . . power, or at the very least what might be termed a controlling influence . . . was the grammarians’ principle motivation.” As mentioned above, any (classical) grammatical tradition presupposes an embeddedness 6

yal

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Of course, it was not only Arabic grammar whose borders were staked out in all clarity by 4th/10th century scholars. It is the era of compendia par excellence. The Mu allaq t are interpreted (e.g. by Abu Bakr Al-Anbari and by al-Na s), dictionaries become truly comprehensive (e.g., Ibn Sida, probably, Al-Azhari), and even biographical compendia affirm the steadfastness of the grammatical tradition (e.g., Ibn al-Nadim, fihrist and al-Zubaydi, Tabaq t). As they will be discussed below, I would also make special note of the qir t in the compilation of Ibn Mujahid. All in all, the development of the language sciences in the ArabicIslamic tradition is perhaps the most remarkable example of corpus planning in the history of linguistics. It is equally noteworthy that this development took place with only limited recourse to an explicit program of status-planning.

2. Oral and Written Language and the Limits of the Grammatical Tradition One point that emerges in the 4th/10th century treatment of language is a marked tilt towards the written language. Without denying that both Sibawaih and al-Farra were constrained by exigencies of written texts, it is clear that they were dealing with a living, variable, oral language. Al-Farra , as seen in (3) above could move with little effort from a written text, the mu af, to a set of related renditions linked to oral practice. Sibawaih (e.g. II: 307ff.) had written symbols to represent various oral pausal alternatives (rawm, i m m, ta iyf ), his morphophonological theory (II: 452ff.) was based on pronunciation, not on orthography, and so on. This situation changed rapidly. As seen above, grammarians such as Ibn Kaysan and Xalaf al-A mar were called upon to write down rules with brevity and concision. Zajjaji ( iy 95) notes that most

in an educational system, and this in turn implies a regulated institutionalization of rights, prerogatives, responsibilities, statuses and the like. However, given that Islamic culture cannot exist without Arabic, and the further axiom that the language requires grammars and grammarians for its maintenance and transmission, the basis of the Arabic grammatical tradition is assured independently of matters of power and prestige. Of course, its status and embeddedness among other Islamic sciences necessarily shifted from era to era as new sciences and new interpretations of old ones became prevalent. These movements may reflect shifts in power, but also ones of taste, fashion, emphasis, intellectual belief, even adaptation to new discoveries.

the grammatical tradition and arabic language teaching 109 people speak according to their nature or disposition, without using i r b.8 Earlier al-Sarraj (al- i uwl I: 35) explains the main function of na w as the means by which people can learn to speak as the Bedouins speak, or perhaps, spoke. Through written grammars the constructed norms attributed to an increasingly distant era and people could be maintained and emulated. Indeed, at the end of the 4th/10th century Rummani (Huduwd 38) states that the overriding goal of grammar (na w) is to provide a means to distinguish between correct and incorrect speech, according to the manner of the Bedouins ( arab), through the application of analogy.9 Today we have tape recordings preserving correct language models; in the 4th/10th century one had grammar and analogy. The grammatical norm becomes identified with an ideal end, but one looking backwards, towards a lost ideal.10 The development and maintenance of norms within a teaching curriculum inevitably implies a limiting of variation and choices. Summaries necessarily exclude, and as seen above, the demand for such summaries grew in the course of the 3rd/9th century. In the light of this, I find it remarkable, though perhaps not surprising, the extent to which the grammarians and ahl al-lu a in general of the 4th/10th century and later preserved indications of the rich diversity documented by Sibawaih, al-Farra and others. I continue to maintain that Weil’s conception of the Basran and Kufan linguistic schools as resulting from later grammarians’ efforts to put order into the diverse practices of earlier grammarians is essentially correct. Opinions diverging from the emerging mainstream were not censored but rather respectfully channeled into holding tanks. If the early era was one of explicatory descriptivism, by the early 4th/10th century Arabic grammar had moved into what may be termed an era of categorizing compartmentalization.

8

i r b of course has by now become the conventional icon for correct grammar. “. . . . . .” 10 Note that this characterization of the relation between the Arabic grammatical tradition and the language it describes is at variance with Ferguson’s conception of the genesis of diglossia. Ferguson (1959: 336) sees the emergence of diglossia in the existence of a large body of literature written in a language or variety different (in time or space) from that of the actual speech community. In the Arab case, it is the actual community which simultaneously creates its ideal norms and projects them out of the actual community (onto the Bedouins, or to an earlier period of Arab history). 9

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This compartmentalizing approach to Arabic grammar was motivated in no small part by basic pedagogical needs. An imperialistic Islamic culture, which by Abbasid times was no longer exclusively Arab, needed grammars and dictionaries for basic language instruction. With a surfeit of linguistic material, it needed simple categorizations, like Basran and Kufan, which sanctioned a terminological and in some instances, a conceptual filter for the production of a relatively unitary grammar. This compartmentalization had significant effects on the development of the grammatical tradition, both positive and negative. Beginning with the positive, after the early 4th/10th century there really was no need to write grammars of Arabic any more. How, after all, can one improve upon Al-Sarraj’s al- u uwl, beyond adding even more compendious detail (e.g. Ibn Ya ish’s ar al-mufa al). That grammars continued to be produced reflects perhaps more upon the power of entrenched professional and bureaucratic interests than upon real academic or pedagogical needs. At this point, of course, the entire Arabic grammatical tradition could have stagnated. Again for reasons beyond the scope of the present talk, and for which I might add I have no immediate answer, the creative linguists looked in new directions. Metatheoretical reflection was important. If Arabic grammar is as it is, why should it be this way at all? The u uwl alna w followed up this line of thought in both inner-linguistic terms, and, as seen briefly above, in terms of the demarcation between grammar and other disciplines, or between language and other phenomena. Equally important were textual, pragmatic and semantic considerations. Jurjani broke new ground in the explication of word order and new/old information, Astarabadhi in the pragmatics of linguistic structure, the scholars of the ilm al wa in semantics. All of these had, in part, extra-linguistic motivations for their work. It was, however, explanations of linguistic structure which were enriched through their work. It is, however, important to bear in mind that all of these scholars and traditions, interesting and important though they are, worked with a finite, fixed set of data. The grammatical and lexical contours of Classical Arabic were indelibly set. This point was recognized by the more perceptive of the grammarians. In the 12th century, for example, the Andalusian grammarian Ba alyawsi (106) remarked that a noun following a demonstrative such as ha¶ in

the grammatical tradition and arabic language teaching 111 4

marartu

bi

ha¶

l-rajul-i

is better regarded as an a f al-bay n than as an adjective (na t), which is its standard categorization. Ba alyawsi does not explain his judgment in detail, though apparently it is because a noun like l-rajul-i is (1) always definite after the demonstrative and perhaps (2) does not belong to a class of nouns ( asm ) which typically clarify or describe ( yubayyin) another noun. In any case, Ba alyawsi probably realized the strength of tradition was far too powerful for any terminological changes. We experience a very different reaction to this state of affairs from another Andalusian, Ibn Ma al-Qur ubiy. Leaving his hirite motivations aside (see Arnaldez 1956: 90–7), Ibn Ma radically rejected the u uwl al-na w traditions, arguing for what may be termed radical surfacism. The only allowable explanatory categories ( ilal), his so-called primary causes, are those “through which knowledge reaches us in pronouncing Arabic comprehended perceptually” (Radd: 131).11 Thus, whereas the standard analysis of a sentence such as 5

zaydun

q ma = Verb + Agent q mØa-Ø

Topic = zaydun

Comment = S = Verb + Agent = q ma-Ø

has an implied or hidden (mustatir) subject pronoun in the verb q ma so that the verb forms a sentence embedded in the comment of the larger sentence, Ibn Ma argues (90–2) that the verb contains no subject pronoun, but instead inherently points to a third person subject in the same way that it inherently has a past tense temporal component. In essence, Ø elements are disallowed by Ibn Ma because they are perceptually unverifiable. It is not my purpose here to discuss the wide-ranging implications of Ibn Ma ’s critique of the grammarians. I would say that interesting though they are, they are linguistically speaking ultimately of piecemeal character, whose adoption would call into question the broad systematicity of Arabic grammatical thinking. Why I mention the example from Ba alyawsi and Ibn Ma ’s criticisms is to suggest that a preoccupation with a finite set of data runs two sorts of risk. First, looking at Ba alyawsi’s remarks, there

11

...

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may emerge a simple inertia which inhibits alternative analyses of grammatical constructions. Secondly, despite Zajjaji’s clear conception of the contingent nature of grammatical explanations cited above, there is the danger that the grammatical characterizations will become reifed to the extent that they, rather than the language itself, become the grammarians’ main preoccupation. Even worse, these conceptualizations, rather than the language itself, may become the dominant reality of the linguist’s analytic world. These latter points, I believe, are the linguistic basis of Ibn Ma ’s criticisms. This leads me to a final remark about the relation between a predominantly pedagogical approach to grammar and the language it categorizes. As noted above, by the 4th/10th century the preservative and normative function of grammar was clearly recognized. If, as it seems, the spoken language was not the language which the grammarians described, such an orientation is probably unavoidable. This last observation serves as a backdrop to the following reflection. From a variety of sources it can be argued that the range of variation in the earliest attested Arabic is considerably greater than that encoded in any single grammar or even grammatical tradition. From the classical tradition alone, put together Sibawaih, al-Farra , various lexicographical works, and the qir t (Owens 2001) and one has material pointing to a formative period (c. pre-130/750) which in many cases leads to an historical reconstruction of proto-Arabic much more diverse than the Classical Arabic of the 4th/10th century grammarians. This is perhaps not surprising, but it does point to a third, and in my list of negatives, biggest drawback in the ascendancy of a pedagogical orientation in the Arabic tradition. Diversity was recorded, but it became an object of reflection only within the narrow confines of the formalistic Kufan-Basran debates.12 Without such reflection, however, the development of linguistic endeavors which today are taken for granted, like comparative grammar, dialectology and sociolinguistics, is unimaginable.

12 Debates which in the classic presentation of Al-Anbari doubtlessly served as a model introduction for students to the art of sophisticated linguistic debate.

the grammatical tradition and arabic language teaching 113 3. The Classical Tradition and Modern Language Teaching There appear to be two opposing opinions about whether the Arabic grammatical tradition is relevant to modern linguistic practices. On the one hand, one can emphasize the serious methodological difficulties in associating traditions from culturally distinct eras (Carter 1987/8), or, alternatively, can accept their relevance but deny their effectiveness (Kouloughli 1999). On the other hand, one can assume that linguistic reflection leads to, or is caused by (it may be impossible and unnecessary to distinguish the direction of causation here), the postulation/ existence of universal analytic categories which will appear wherever men and women attempt formal descriptions of language. I of course follow the latter course (Owens 1988, 2000), and this leads me, inter alia, to an axiomatic belief in the relevance of the Arabic tradition to modern Arabic language teaching. To say that it is relevant, however, is not the same thing as saying it is useful. Consider for example the following derivation of the form qultu “I said”, as explained by Mubarrad in his Muqta ab (I: 97) or Ibn al-Sarraj (al-Muwjaz: 161). 6

A classical derivation of qultu 1. *qawal-tu al 2. *qawul-tu transmutation (naql) of a to u 3. *quwl-tu metathesis (ta wiyl ) of wu 4. qul-tu semivowel deletion in context wCC

Each of these steps is motivated by analogous phenomenon is comparable forms. Step 4, for instance is quite general. The deletion of a semivowel in the context w/yCC/#

occurs in yaqul-na (< yaquwl-na) (lam), yaqul (< yaquwl#). Step 2, the transmutation (naql) of a to u is largely arbitrary, though constrained in one respect. qawula cannot be taken as the underlying form, since no transitive verbs are of this form. The third step, ta wiyl, for want of a better term translated here as metathesis, is perhaps motivated only by internal formal exigencies. Without it the transition to step 4, the surface form, would be impossible. Step 3 is convincing more on the basis of faith than on linguistic rigor. Highly structured systems, such as the Arabic is, require a certain degree of faith, however,

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and so long as blatant arbitrariness is kept to a minimum, should be given the benefit of the doubt, at least until something better comes by. It is instructive in this respect to look at more or less contemporary treatments of the same phenomena. One such work is that of Angoujard (1990: 66ff.). 7

A modern derivation of xiftu xawiftu base form * * * * * * * x a w i f ] t u13 ↓ xaif]tu Semivowel deletion (SVD) x a i f] t u 1 2 3 4 ↓ xif]tu or xaf]tu Three slots rule (TSR) for canonical CVC structure x a/i f ] t u 1 2 3 ↓ xif ]tu deletion of a, since f non-sonorant = xiftu

Without going into details, the form xiftu is derived from the underlying form *xawiftu via three rules. First, the semivowel w is deleted between sonorant peaks, in this case between a and i. Secondly, a rule is (partially) motivated which deletes one of two adjacent vowels, in order that a canonical CVC syllable be maintained. Finally, it is stipulated that in the sequence ai, a be deleted if the syllable coda is non-sonorant. f in this instance of course is non-sonorant. Both Mubarrad’s and Angoujard’s models combine interesting generalization with stipulatory arbitariness arising in part at least from the straightjacket of the morphophonological rules themselves. The 13 Angoujard’s account deals with weak medial verbs of the form CawiC-. It does not, so far as I can determine, give a comprehensive account of verbs like *qawal = Caw/yaC. His account of the derivation of xiftu from *xawiftu works for qultu only from step 2 in Mubarrad’s derivation, i.e. from an input with the second stem vowel a high vowel. It is not clear how, or whether, Angoujard would get from *qawal to *qawul. It may be that Angoujard, like Mubarrad, would be impelled to posit an arbitrary vocalic transmutation to ensure the correct input into the SVD.

the grammatical tradition and arabic language teaching 115 treatments stand or fall as “explanations” of the behavior of medial weak verbs according to how one evaluates both the larger theory of morphophonology in which they are embedded, and the success of these particular treatments within this larger theory. As practical pedagogical aids, however, in a narrow sense I find both equally useless. Simply the fact that to “explain” the workings of these rules one has to go into details of medieval Arabic or generative phonology means that precious teaching time has to be sacrificed for theoretical issues which potentially bring little gain in active language control. In a larger sense, however, their relevance is assured from two perspectives. First, by definition language teaching goes hand in hand with language learning, and language learning is, presumably, explicable in terms of cognitive and linguistic processes. Such processes can only be represented via theoretical constructs, perhaps (and a very large question mark needs to placed here) like those outlined in (6) and (7). Secondly I have found that (young adult) students find it reassuring when learning the complicated morphology of weak verbs to know that what they are studying has been treated within a general Arabic theory of morphology (i.e., Sarf ), with complicated rules describing the behavior of semivowels (qalb). Perhaps finding common cause with learners from the past is confirmation that the problem lies in the language, not in their own inadequacies.14 The remark in the last paragraph suggests a further link between practical matters of language teaching and the Arabic grammatical tradition. Even if many of the detailed rules formulated in the Arabic tradition are of marginal, or even of no value at all in teaching Arabic as a second language in a western context, the tradition itself is testimony to the centrality of the Arabic language in appreciating Arabic-Islamic culture. Ideally, in my view, all students who specialize in Arabic should have some first-hand exposure to this rich and intellectually challenging tradition. Minimally, in any case, it is strategically appropriate to make students learning Arabic aware, even in passing, that the Arabic language as we know it owes its existence 14 I might note in passing that I have settled on the following strategy in introducing the morphology of medial weak forms. I distinguish between long and short stems of weak verbs, e.g. quwl and qaal- vs. qul-, based on the paramater, -V initial suffix on the verb (requiring long stem, qaal-at, ya-quwl-u) vs. -C initial suffix (requiring the short stem, qul-tu, ya-qul-na). Further rules, of course are needed to assue correct vowel quality.

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in part, as it were, to the descriptive and theoretical endeavors of generations of grammarians. But having attempted to confirm the link between modern language teaching and the Arabic grammatical tradition, I would like to reaffirm a critical point raised at the end of section 2. If a link exists, it exists to the tradition in its entirety, to its grandeur, but also to its shortcomings, to its undoubted brilliance, but also to its disappointing silence about linguistic domains which have since become recognized as an integral part of the analytic complex called language. Especially unfortunate, in my opinion, is the failure to make a rich variational literature which so blatantly permeates the earliest grammatical works the object of theoretical reflection. To the extent that the qir t are even studied today, they are treated as naked lists, shorn of linguistic urgency. The Kit b of Sibawaih is certainly the symbol of Arabic grammar, but in general not an object of intellectual challenge, which it must be to anyone who attempts to read and understand it. What I am suggesting is that a critical and comprehensive examination of the Arabic grammatical tradition will have repercussions about what one considers the Arabic language to have been and therefore to be today. A return to the era of explicatory descriptivism might raise fundamental questions about Arabic, which necessarily will impinge upon language teaching.

CHAPTER EIGHT

TEACHING ARABIC DIALECTOLOGY IN EUROPEAN UNIVERSITIES: WHY, WHAT, AND HOW1 Soha Abboud-Haggar

Introduction When I was appointed to Salamanca University in 1997 to teach Arabic Dialectology, I was one of the few professors trying to make headway in this new educational field in Spain; we were exposed to many difficulties that each of us tried to solve as best as possible, following the Department’s guidance and exploiting our personal abilities. Some professors introduced Rabat’s colloquial Arabic, which generated great interest because of the historical and strategic ties linking Spain with its neighbour, Morocco. Others stressed teaching al-Andalus’s Arabic, a vanished colloquial variety that has been much studied recently for several reasons, mainly because it is a base for the formation of many Spanish words and toponomies. A third group was concerned with teaching Arabic spoken in Cairo, not only because of its diffusion in the Arab world owing to the fame of its singers and actors, but also because it is a phonologically stable colloquial variety.

Why is Teaching Dialectology Important? However, teaching a specific colloquial variety of Arabic was not the main goal of Arabic Dialectology within the newly introduced Arabic 1 My acknowledgements go to El-Said Badawi, Alaa Elgibali and Zeinab Ibrahim, members of the Arabic Language Institute of the American University in Cairo, for organizing such an interesting academic meeting in our beloved Cairo, and for Kees Versteegh for his encouragement. My special thanks go to Mrs. Renée Abboud for her most appreciated assistance in translating the conference from its original Arabic text.

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Language Departments’ programs, whether in the school of Philology or Arts. Although studying any of the colloquial Arabic varieties enables the specialized students to understand speakers of that particular variety, it does not give them an overall view of the dialectal reality, which is more linked to the Arabic peoples’ idiosyncrasies than Classical Arabic, the variety first studied by most students. It immediately became evident that we had to expand the scope of Dialectology for many reasons. Firstly, because the Arabic Language Department must guarantee a broad education for its students, which is only possible if they are acquainted with the linguistic reality of the Arab world. This means students must be provided with the necessary tools for understanding modern scientific research and publications related to Arabic linguistics, including, of course, dialectology, which has blossomed over the past fifty years and is still progressing thanks to the evolution of studies in other fields such as sociology. Students must also be able to fully understand literary works, whether they are entirely or partly written in colloquial Arabic. This is specially necessary for reading popular literature, which reflects social mentality through proverbs, sayings, songs, plays, poetry or zajal and caricatures. Second, Arabic language departments must try to arouse students’ interest in working in the field of dialectology, whether in data collection on a specific language variety and the setting of its maps, in the sphere of linguistics—phonology, morphology, lexis and syntax—, or within sociolinguistics. Much research needs to be conducted in all these fields.2 Finally, perhaps the most important aim of teaching dialectology in Arabic departments of Western universities is to make students proficient speakers of any colloquial variety by teaching and encouraging the use and oral comprehension of that particular variety. This means the University will have to enable students to communicate with native speakers at a level quite different from Classical, considered an artificial register even for Arabic-speaking people. Such ability not only means that students could live anywhere in the Arab 2 As Kristen Brustad has affirmed in the introduction to her recent book, there is a lot of work still to be done in Arabic Dialectology: “However, the picture remains far from complete. In addition to vast geographic and social territory that has yet to be canvassed, little attention has been paid to comparative syntactic data and even a comparative morphological study is lacking (though enough published material for such a study exists)” (2000: 1).

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world, but that he or she would be able to understand the art and media of most Arab societies, and to gain a deeper understanding of its culture and mentality.

What to Teach in Arabic Dialectology? To achieve these goals, I have prepared the material submitted here, which is made up of two complementary and interrelated sections: the first, or theoretical, section contains what may be described as the history of dialects and a comparative study of colloquial Arabic varieties as a whole. The second, or practical, section includes an empirical study of a specific language variety in its spoken, auditory and written aspects; this study is carried out in a continuous comparison with Classical Arabic. Theoretical Topics I have learnt from my teaching experience that it is expedient to begin this course by situating students within the overall framework through which the science of Dialectology has evolved, from an independent and almost depreciated occupation of philologists to a discipline directly related to grammar and linguistics schools. Students will therefore understand how the traditional methods of Dialectology (gathering linguistic data through direct or indirect surveys and questionnaires) began and operated, and on which basis the first linguistics maps were organized. Afterwards, they will get to know the decisive influence that different grammatical theories have had on Dialectology, from the establishment of the German Neogrammar School (mid-19th century), the spread of Saussure’s Structuralism and Chomsky’s Generative grammar, and Labov’s Sociolinguistics approach to language in the seventies (Petyt 1980, Francis 1983, Chambers 1980, Hudson 1980, and Viaplana 1996). This general introduction aims at familiarizing students with the principles of dialectology and explaining some of its basic scientific terminology such as language variety, variation in style, variation in language, diglossia, and other terms—that is indispensable for the absorption of this subject matter and its rules. Students will come to realize that Arabic, as all other languages, has been studied by philologists and dialectologists (from the orientalist

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and arabist schools) mostly concerned with its old colloquial varieties from the pre-Islamic and Classical epoch. This came as a result of the Neogrammar School’s concept of language and of its scholars’ focus on studying modern varieties for their importance in shedding light on the ancient ones.3 Students will also realize that the methods of traditional dialectology, with their geographic approach, have specially encouraged a comparative view between dialects. Next comes learning that modern linguistics theories have generated both Structuralist dialectology4 and Generative dialectology, which have promoted the study of colloquial varieties as systems with their own elements and characteristics. This was followed by the Sociolinguistics approach, which dictated that each of these elements—whether lexical, phonological, morphological or syntactic—might be representative of a society, or certain layers within a particular society. Consequently, students will recognize the three axes for the study of Arabic dialects: the diachronic or historical axis that mainly leads to the study of pre-Islamic colloquial varieties within the framework of dialectology, the synchronic axis which promotes the comparative study between the varieties and finally, the linguistic axis which deals with the varieties as a system with its components. Arriving at this conclusion will open up the door to the first main chapter within the theoretical topics of Dialectology, the one concerned with the general study of Arabic colloquial varieties in the pre-Islamic era, in the Arabian Peninsula exclusively, and in the postIslamic era in all those regions where Arabic has spread until our present time. With regard to the Arabic dialects spoken by the different tribes in the pre-Islamic Arabian Peninsula, it would be of interest to students to learn about its sources and the views of early Islamic

3 As G. Janssens has written in “Stress in Arabic and word structure in the Modern Arabic dialects” “it is possible to reconstruct the stress of Old Arabic, from which Classical Arabic developed as well as the old Arabic dialects. In order to perform this reconstruction, we use as a documentation the stress of the modern colloquials” (1972, introduction). In the same way, David Cohen began one of his most important articles in 1962: “Quel est le rapport entre la koiné poétique coranique et les dialectes vivants?”. 4 Uriel Weinreich’s article “Is a structural dialectology possible”, published in 1954 meant the passing of Traditional dialectology into the framework of modern linguistics methodology.

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scholars like Sibawayh, al-Jahiz, and al-Suyuti and how we could extract, from available sources, the characteristics of each variety as were described mainly by those grammarians themselves. So at a phonological level, we know that some tribes used to pronounce /k/ as [t ] or [ts] (described as ka ka a and fahfaha phonetic phenomena), others pronounced the /y / of the imperfective as [ je] instead of [ ja] (the taltala phenomenon), and others the vowel /a/ as [e] and even as [i] (described as im la). Actually, most of those phenomena still constitute the main features of many current colloquial varieties. Islamic scholars also described—in an imprecise and unorganized way—morphological and syntactic characteristics, such as the declension of some striking cases and the phenomenon described as akal n al-bar G y (Rabin 1951, Abd al-Tawwab 1987 and al-Mutallabi 1978). Those pre-Islamic varieties—amongst which the differences are still very difficult to determine due, among other reasons, to the nature of the sources—can be classified using three criteria; geographical, tribal, and sociological. Geographical classification differentiates between Oriental and Occidental varieties, each with its own features (for example, the first group used ¶ al- iyya while the second m al-Hij ziyya); this classification is mostly imprecise because of the nomadic life of Arab tribes in the Peninsula but it has generally been accepted since its publication at the end of the 19th century. Tribal classification separates northern from southern Arab tribes, as qaysiyy n from yamaniyy n, each having their own linguistic features. Finally, the sociological classification differentiates between sedentary varieties, like those of the tribes established in Mecca, and Bedouin, like the nomads pertaining to Tam m confederation. With the revelation of the Holy Koran and further Arab conquests, the linguistic situation changed completely, not only with respect to Classical Arabic, which was normalized and standardized on the basis of fixed rules forming the highest pole of the diglossia, but also in relation to the various colloquial varieties as a whole, which constitute the actual dialectal outlook of the Arabic language to date (Badawi 1973, Blau 1988, and Levin 1998). But before addressing colloquial varieties and their comparative and synchronic study, it would be convenient that students become acquainted with Middle Arabic, found in medieval documents and manuscripts and which constitutes an important source of information about the language situation in any Arabic speaking society at

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any time between the 8th and 18th centuries.5 As has been asserted by J. Blau in one of his recent studies on Middle Arabic, those documents witness an important language reality since they enable us to trace the origins of modern dialectal features back to the Middle Ages.6 In this context, reference should be made to the importance of Middle Arabic documents produced in al-Andalus and written either in Arabic or in old Spanish, as a unique source for the study of a disappeared colloquial variety of Arabic and the determination of its characteristics (Corriente 1977 & 1997).

5 The interesting conference of professor Kees Versteegh at our congress shed light on that important section of dialectology, called “Middle Arabic”, which I think might need more specification to acquire accuracy. From my point of view, we should not place in the same category the “historical documents” of Middle Arabic—say the ones produced in Egypt, or in Palestine in the 9th or 10th century— and the modern ones—like those produced by Morrocans in the Netherlands by the end of the 20th century, following the example given by professor Versteegh himself—just because of the fact that both classes contain a mixed variety of Arabic— classical and dialectal—with all its known social features, types of errors and corrections. As I have written in my book “Introducción a la dialectología de la lengua árabe”, it would be more accurate to distinguish between what can be called “historical documents”, which are the only means we have to examine the historical situation of any colloquial variety, and “modern documents”. By “modern documents” I mean the different types of documents which contain dialectal features from the second half of the XIX century—when dialectologists began observing all the living colloquial varieties, collecting data among native Arabs by any of the then recent scientific methods of Traditional dialectology and the norms of the German Neogrammar School, and providing specific information about the various language varieties they studied—onward (Abboud-Haggar, 2003, 74–5). This means that the term “Middle Arabic” would be only applied to documents produced between the 7th and the 18th century—like the term “Middle English” is only used to designate documents produced between the 12th and the 15th century—in which the mixture of colloquial and classical Arabic is the main feature, while we can call the documents containing that mixture produced since the 19th century “Language varieties written in modern texts”. That long period of the “Middle Arabic” can be divided in two periods: the “Early Middle Arabic”—following the terms used by Blau—the documents produced until the 11th century, coinciding with the traditional Literary division of the Abbasid Caliphate, and the “Late Middle Arabic”, documents produced between that century until the end of the 18th century. This new classification should give precision to “Middle Arabic” which is one of the best sources of documentation not only about disappeared varieties like the Andalusian or Sicilian, but also about the Medieval situation of any of our modern colloquial varieties. 6 Blau, 1999, 223. Until the publication of this study I have not had the opportunity to read the most recent book of professor Joshua Blau, A handbook of Early Middle Arabic (2002).

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Colloquial language Varieties Still within the theoretical topics section, we now reach a chapter dealing with colloquial Arabic dialects as a whole, spoken by numerous societies that adopted Arabic following Arab conquests—launched soon after the Prophet’s death in the 7th century—and known as New language. In this section, students become familiar with the common features of all the colloquial varieties identified by many scholars7 (Versteegh 1997, Cohen 1970, Ferguson 1996, Fischer 1980, and Kaye 1976). Students will therefore find out that in spite of apparent differences amongst dialects, there are many common features which allow us to deal with a large number of dialects taking their common aspects, among which I shall mention only two: First, their classification along geographical and historical criteria, as well as the degree of permanence of the Arabic language in a population after coming into contact with Arabs. As regards to geographical classification, dialects are divided into Oriental and Occidental varieties, with each group having its own particular set of characteristics such as the tendency of Occidental varieties to eliminate vowels and to conjugate the 1st person singular with the n n as preformative instead of the traditional alif, while Oriental dialects tend to the im la of the vowel /a/. Historically, colloquial varieties of Arabic can be divided into two groups: the ancient or medieval varieties, which started with the adoption of Arabic in the conquered land and lasted until the eve of the literary nah a, determined by the entrance of Napoleon’s French expedition to Egypt and the ascension of Muhammad Ali as khedive of that country; and the modern varieties, the living dialects which progress and evolve in present Arab societies, and whose speakers consider Modern Standard Arabic the highest pole in the diglossic situation today. Regarding their classification on the basis of the degree of permanence of Arabic among the different peoples, we shall notice that some varieties disappeared completely from lands where Arabic was once spoken, as was the case in al-Andalus and Sicily. The situation in Iran is similar because the language was completely lost in colloquial usage and only the graphic alphabet remained. 7 Some of these features are, besides the disappearance of declension endings in practically all the dialects, the disappearance of the dual in verbs and pronouns, the use of the relative pronoun “ elli”, and the change of the normalized order of the sentence.

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In other cases, Arabic became the language of minorities, like in Khuzistan, in Iran, Balkh, in Afghanistan, and the Kormakiti isle in Cyprus. In others, Arabic was only used as a religious language in lands opened to Islam by non-Arab forces, such as the Seldjuk, the Mongols, the Egyptian Mameluks, and the Ottomans; this is the case of many regions, like Armenia, Northern Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, Malaysia, the Chinese region of Xinjian, Indonesia, and others. Finally, there are the dialects of peoples who adopted Arabic as their vernacular language and became Arabic-speaking societies. Those are the twenty Arab countries of today. The countries and Emirates of the Arabian Peninsula must be given special consideration, since it is the region where Arabic began and evolved (Holes 1995 and Ingham 1982). In this classification, mention must be made of Arabic varieties introduced by Arab immigrants to the American and European continents in the last two centuries (Abu Haidar 1994, Alosh 1994, and Bakalla 1983 & 1984). The second common aspect of Arabic dialects deals with the factors that must be borne in mind for an accurate interpretation of linguistic data after collection and exposition. As established by Dialectology, the process of collecting linguistic data is mainly carried out through personal interviews or indirect surveys with a questionnaire that is submitted to respondents. With regard to old varieties, extraction of data is only possible through the examination and study of documents and manuscripts. Collecting linguistic data is followed by the retrieval of necessary information and its correct application to reach the objectives aimed at. In the case of Arabic colloquial varieties, there are many factors which must be taken into consideration in order to make a correct interpretation of data because, actually, those factors have influenced, and still do, each of the colloquial varieties. They can be summarized in three categories: The historical factors, which comprise the language which the inhabitants of the conquered lands spoke before contact with Arabic, the way the Arab conquest occurred, the tribal constitution of the Arabs participating in those campaigns, Arab settlement patterns in the different areas and the extent to which they mingled with the vernaculars. All these historical factors show the process of arabization of these societies and the influence of the Arabic variety they happened to come in contact with. Not only the first centuries are important for understanding some features found in the colloquial

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varieties, but also the historical evolution of every society or country and the circumstances which permitted, for example, the formation of lexis of foreign origin. The geographical conditions that Arabic speaking societies live in: this means that we can be dealing with agrarian, urban or desert societies. This factor determines many features found in colloquial varieties, because, as is the case with other languages, the type of settlement influences the dialect of its population. Peasants, for example, are conservative and not inclined to introduce changes in their speech—although the spread of mass media has changed this situation—while city dwellers are open to change and willing to absorb new features through the known dialectological processes of accommodation, generalization, levelling and reduction, and they usually diffuse their own dialect to the surrounding localities. In the desert, which occupies large parts of the Arabic-speaking world, Bedouin tribes maintained their own dialect throughout centuries and only mixed to a certain degree with settled populations. In the process of sedentarization, which is gradually increasing, Bedouin tribes tended to settle in semi-nomadic societies at the borders of rural societies, passing their dialectal features and their conservative tendency among many Arab societies. Consequently, when analyzing linguistic data related to any Arabic colloquial variety in order to apply it to any type of research, consideration must be given to those factors which separate settled varieties—both urban and agrarian—from Bedouin varieties. Such division has no relation with political frontiers but with the geographic nature of settlements and its influence on its inhabitants. An interesting example is the case of Morocco; there, urban varieties, which predominate in Casablanca and Rabat, co-exist with agrarian varieties in the Atlas range, while Bedouin varieties are mostly found in the South, but also mingle with settled populations. Distinction should also be made between Bedouin varieties, like those spoken in the Syrian desert b diyat a - m or in the Arabian Peninsula, and rural varieties which denote a clear influence of Bedouin dialects and are therefore designated as Bedouin type varieties, such as those spoken by Palestinians in Galilee. Bedouin characteristics, of Bedouin varieties or Bedouin type varieties are distinguishable because of their specific features, as for example, the conservation of the interdental phonemes like /y/ and /¶/ and the velarized /Î/ and the conservation of

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gender differentiation in verbs and pronouns in plural (Blanc 1964, Caubet 1993, Cleveland 1963, Holes 1987, Ingham 1982, Jastrow 1978 & 1981, Marçais 1977, and Zawadowski 1978). Finally, the social composition of populations is relevant in determining the data collected. So, it is indispensable to study the different social components, the ethnic, religious or national minorities, and the different social strata, in order to determine the influence of each class over others and which class is predominant in that society. It is also relevant to take into consideration women’s roles, for women are carriers and transmitters of linguistic features to children. Finally, one must consider the influence any foreign language has had on any Arabic-speaking society, in particular the impact of the colonizing forces in Arab countries until the mid-20th century (Talmoudi 1984 and Holes 1987 & 1995). Modern Colloquial Language Varieties After offering students an outlook on colloquial varieties, we must now emphasize the modern dialect that they will be exposed to when visiting, listening or meeting any of its speakers. Before we proceed, it is convenient to clarify what a dialect area means within the discipline of Dialectology—its empirical bases, questionnaires, surveys and data collection, interregional boundaries or isoglosses methodology of the dialect geography—in order to understand why Neogrammar philologists and dialectologists decided to divide the Arabic-speaking world into five dialect areas by the end of the 19th century, a division still considered valid today. Following that division, the five different dialect areas are: Arabian area, Mesopotamian area, Syrian area, Egyptian area and the Maghreb area. However, recent investigations are stressing the convenience of adding a sixth dialect area, considering the colloquial Arabic varieties of Central Africa as a new and independent area, comprising Sudan as its centre, Chad and Nigeria (Abu Absi 1966 & 1968, Chambers 1980, Ingham 1982, Kaye 1976 and Owens 1993). Regarding these areas, information should be given on its geography and boundaries, their extent in different countries, considered here in terms of political (not linguistic) boundaries, their internal divisions, the most important bibliography,8 their special features, etc. Actually, it is an open

8

By “historic bibliography” I mean the various studies published—already by

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field which can be enriched with all sorts of information and maps9 (Fischer and Jastrow 1980). Next in the curriculum of Dialectology is a general comparative study of the different modern varieties already pointed out on maps, so students can observe that the differences between them are not as wide and profound as they seem and that they are mostly related to phonology and lexis rather than to morphology or syntax. Students will learn that, compared with Classical Arabic, most dialects have introduced phonological changes mainly in five consonants, one of them being the unvoiced uvular occlusive phoneme [q], which is pronounced as in its normalized state in the Bedouin and rural Bedouin-type varieties in the Syrian area and among what got to be called by Jastrow the qeltu varieties in the Mesopotamian area. In most cities, from Syria to Morocco, it is pronounced as an unvoiced glottal occlusive phoneme / /, and, in the Arabian area and south of Egypt, as a voiced postpalatal phoneme [g]. Students will also notice that the vowel quantity is no longer essential since accent patterns become more relevant, pushing Hur f almadd into the background, depending on accent placement; that all Arabic speakers add euphonic or apenthetic vowels to their speech when connecting different words together. These vowels are inserted between a group of three consonants to avoid a pronunciation alien to the Arabic tongue and ear. Cairenes insert that vowel between the second and third consonant, while Syrians from Damascus place it between the first and the second consonant, giving each dialect its special rhythm ( Janssens 1972, Durand 1995, Cantineau 1953, Abboud 1978, Ambros 1977, Jastrow 1978, and Prochazka 1988). At the morphological level, mention must be made to the almost complete abandonment of the internal passive voice and its substitution by forms VII infa ala and VIII ifta ala, the rather total disappearance the second half of the 19th century—on the different sites, tribes or localities within each dialect area and which constitutes the first testimony of a dialectological approach to Arabic dialects; for example, Jayakar studied Oman in 1889; Landberg did the same on South Arabia in 1901 and on Lebanon in 1883, while Wiessbach made an anthology of Iraki colloquial texts in 1908 and Bled de Braine published a similar anthology on Egypt in 1846, followed by Spitta-Bey in 1880 and 1883. In 1915, Bergstässer published the first dialect map on the whole Arab world in his article entitled “Sprachatlas von Syrien und Palästina” (Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins 38, Leipzig, 169–222). 9 Dialectal maps of the six areas in which the arabic speaking world is divided can be seen in Abboud-Haggar (2003, 117–129).

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of the dual from verbs, adjectives and pronouns, and the profound changes introduced in the numerical system if compared with Classical Arabic: all dialects have simplified the morphology of compound numbers, kept number agreement between numerals and numbered objects, and adapted pronunciation to their own characteristics. At the syntactical level, we have to indicate one of the most relevant changes with respect to Classical Arabic, consisting of the use of a particular word innovated in all colloquial varieties in order to facilitate the possession genitive and annexation cases and which only differs from one region to another in the particle used. In the Syrian dialect area, for example, Arabic speakers use the word mit or tib , while in the Saudi area, they use Hagg and in Egypt, bit ; in those three cases, the non-normalized particle agrees in gender and number with the noun it refers to, while in other regions it is indeclinable, like in the Mesopotamian area where they use m l in all cases, as well as in various parts of the Magreb area where mit is also used without declension (Fischer and Jastrow 1980, Kaye and Rosenhouse 1998, and Retsö 1983 & 1992). Thus, students will realize that there is, in fact, a phonetic, morphological, syntactic and lexical basic system common to all colloquial varieties, since we are dealing with dialects of the same language, and will become acquainted with their differences thanks to this comparative exposition. Finally, they will have acquired a general idea of the main characteristics of each variety through the synchronic point of view offered. Dialectology and the Development of Linguistic Theories and Their Influence on the Study of Arabic Dialects After seeing the breakthrough of Traditional dialectology focused on the Arabic language and its modern colloquial varieties—like dialect areas and comparative studies of all available and easy to reach dialects—we now come to the last part of the Theoretical topics of the program of Dialectology, which address the further development in linguistic theories beginning in the 1920’s with Saussure, followed by Chomsky and, finally, Labov and their influence on linguistic studies of Arabic and its colloquial varieties. This evolution led to a shift in the interest of dialectologists, who began to conduct field studies on colloquial varieties as independent linguistic systems, highlighting their components in all linguistics

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aspects. Dialectology made yet another shift when linguistic findings began to be applied to sociological studies and dialects were seen as bearers of social indications, apart from the rules of the normalized variety acquired by learning. Thus, in this last part on modern colloquial varieties, students will deal with the different tools of modern dialectology; its terminology and concepts like variation in language, diglossia, variation of style, etc., and linguistic methods, such as studying verb patterns in rural Palestinian areas around the Jordan lake, or the application of sociolinguistic methods to study the Damascene society, the social components of the Bahrain society through its dialects or any of the numerous and rich linguistically and dialectologically Arabic-speaking regions (Mohammad 1999, Blanc 1965, Haeri 1996, Elgibali 1993, Herrero 1996, Holes 1987, and Mitchell 1994). To conclude this section on Arabic Dialectology, through the evolution of the discipline of Dialectology itself, I would like to mention an interesting remark made by linguist and arabist Kristen Brustad, who, in her recent comparative study on four Arabic dialects, pointed out that “Arabic dialectology has much to offer to linguistic theory [because of the large geographic area and range of variation among Arabic dialects]. The wealth of information that may be collected and studied over such a large area, the great amount of historical evidence that can be brought to bear as well as increasingly detailed studies on social history, all make Arabic a powerful case for testing, proving and even generating theory” (2000: 1). Actually, the multiplication of studies on Arabic dialects everywhere in the world within the frame of Arabic dialectology is proof of the full incorporation of Arabic studies on an international scale. Teaching a Specific Colloquial Variety, the Practical Topic of the Course The theoretical topics discussed are not enough to provide students of Arabic with a comprehensive training as specialists in Arabic language, philology or culture. It is up to the University to complete this theoretical section with an applied practical learning of any of the modern varieties in order to provide students with the appropriate tools that will enable them to deal with the general material of Dialectology and with speakers of that particular dialect, and to understand any other variety or varieties as needed.

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How to proceed Experience has shown me that learning any colloquial variety starting from knowledge of Classical Arabic makes the process of understanding and absorbing all the linguistic aspects of the dialect easier, quicker and more accurate. With this system, students will learn that, contrary to what happens in fus a, verbs and adjectives (in Cairene, if it is the chosen dialect, like in most sedentary dialects) are never declined in dual but agree with their dual noun, whether masculine or feminine, in plural, like el walad n gom ‘The two boys came,’ and el bent n gom ‘The two girls came,’ (never el bent n gat); that the verb of a feminine plural noun agrees with it whether in singular feminine or in the common plural, like el ban t gom or el ban t gat; and that no elements differentiate between genders in the plural suffixed pronouns, like arab-hom, for a masculine accusative and a feminine one (al-Tonsy 1986, Ahmed 1992, Tomiche 1964, Behnsted 1985–88, Mitchell 1956 & 1962, and Norlin 1987). In this respect, I would like to share some of my practical experience in teaching a given variety of Arabic in a European University. First of all, the practical application of learning a certain dialect—which in my case was the Cairene variety—should follow the theoretical topics of the program because the gradual applied learning of the chosen dialect’s features enhances students’ understanding of the compared characteristics of colloquial varieties as a whole. Second, when teaching a particular variety, one must begin explaining its phonetic features and its phonological system in order to ensure the correct assimilation of its basic particularities, such as the continuous conjunction between the words themselves as well as between the word and different affixed morphemes, the constant changes in accent placement and the regular conservation or dropping of long vowels within the acoustic segment formed as a result of conjunctions between syllables. These phonetic lessons will enable students to understand auditory material, such as songs in colloquial, and different styles of text written in colloquial. Third, and with respect to texts in general, I would like to point out that in teaching a chosen variety we can deal with different sorts of texts; the most useful for our purpose are didactic texts and those written to be read by natives. With respect to the first type, they are prepared to apply the rules learnt in class and are generally written in Arabic characters, accompanied, in most cases, by its tran-

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scription in Latin letters. With regards to texts, written in colloquial and meant to be read by native speakers, they consist of poems, songs, plays, caricatures and even novels. Each kind of text has its own problems which may be solved mainly by giving a solid phonetic description of the studied dialect: for the first type of texts, the written Latin alphabet impedes students from getting familiar with and comprehending literary texts written in a colloquial variety,10 although it guarantees a clear representation of the vowels. With regard to the second type, the problem is the method used by each author to express colloquial words, and among whom we can hardly find a regular system. For example, there are differences in expressing the fat a at the end of the word, the pronouns or prepositions, the proper way to express the joining of the pre-formative H and b to its verb or the joining of the words to each other and the expression of that joining vowels used phonetically only. To solve this situation, I saw it suitable that students be provided with colloquial texts written in Arabic alphabet, whether prepared for didactic purposes or for internal consumption, but not before the phonetic and phonological systems of the dialect have been thoroughly explained. Thus students will get used to reading those texts and gradually understanding morphological rules. Fourth, acquiring vocabulary becomes a relatively easy process for students already familiar with Classical variety lexis. Students have to be able to connect between the Classical lexis and the colloquial one following the phonological rules learned earlier; they must be aware of the lexical and semantic particularities of the dialect in joining words when pronounced, in avoiding homonimia and sinonimia, in innovating all kinds of words as a result of arabizing loanwords—acceptance of which within the familiar vocabulary depends only on its acceptance by the society—and in fossilizing compound words formed by the conjunction of one or more words, which is used like any other lexis in a Cairene’s everyday life like, for example,

10 The use of the Latin alphabet in the transcription of colloquial Arabic is the most practical way I’ve found to explain in class the rules of a chosen variety while I limit the use of Arabic alphabet when pointing to Classical Arabic; in fact, European university students are used to these transcriptions and can read them easily. However, as transcriptions are not always the same in all didactic texts transcribed in Latin alphabet—somehow an obstacle for students—I prefer using texts written in Arabic, whether prepared for teaching or taken from popular literature, after a thorough explanation of phonological rules.

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132 ennaharda, ‘Today’,

delwa ti ‘Now’, and

bal

‘Never

mind’. Finally, I would like to point out the importance of offering Dialectology in the final year of the M.A., to guarantee sufficient knowledge of Arabic grammar rules as a base for learning colloquial varieties. I have observed that students with weak grammar or linguistics skills are unable to assimilate dialect characteristics, lacking as they do a solid starting basis.

Conclusions The present study has aimed at presenting the basic elements of this new subject, which has been included in the educational curricula of many European universities, to follow new trends in linguistics and to become a useful complement in the education of students specializing in Arabic philology, literature or translation. It does not only provide a practical learning of colloquial varieties, but it also gives a global view of the dialect reality of Arabic language. When we structure Arabic dialectology within the framework of general Dialectology in which it has evolved, we give students the opportunity to get acquainted with the necessary insertion of preIslamic dialects among the material studied, with the similarities and differences between all colloquial varieties formed after the expansion of Arabs all over the then known world, with the division of our modern varieties in five—or even six—dialect areas, and with the new course Dialectology applied to Arabic language took after the success of linguistic revolutions in structuralism, generativism and sociolinguistics. Finally, students will come to the realization that there is still a lot to do and study in the field of Arabic Dialectology; and that to get involved in that process, he or she will need to master at least one colloquial variety. The inclusion of Arabic dialectology in the curricula of the departments of Arabic studies in Schools of Philology is another evidence of what has been confirmed by many, such as Milka Ivic, who wrote in the mid 1960’s: “Many changes have been introduced in Philology studies concerning its traditional fields of investigation as new issues have been added like the cultural history of languages and its various varieties related to any of its societies and to its popular literature” (Ivic 1965).

CHAPTER NINE

AN ERROR ANALYSIS OF MALAY STUDENTS’ WRITTEN ARABIC Adil Elsheikh Abdalla

1. Background Malays1 are highly motivated people with regard to learning Arabic and the proper recitation of the Holy Qur an. They are in fact widely acclaimed, including in pan-Islamic contests, with respect to their precision in the artful articulation of Quran recitation. In addition to having religious and cultural significance for Malays, Arabic is essential for fostering ties with the Arab world, where there is a rapidly growing market for Malaysian products. As such, Arabic has found a solid base in Malaysia where it is widely taught in both secular schools and religious pondoks and madrasahs.2 At the territorial level, most universities offer Arabic language programs (Abdalla 1997). Like other learners of Arabic, Malays are confronted by certain difficulties when asked to express themselves in Arabic, resulting in a failure to express ideas (Chik 1988). Unfortunately, very few studies attempt to examine these difficulties. Most of them followed the CA approach. A brief review of relevant literature showed a number of studies, including the following: a study by Sokimi (1980) that contrasted Arabic and BM; Abu Khudairi’s analysis of errors in Malay students’

1

Malaysia is made up of three ethnic groups: Malays, Chinese and Indians. Malays are considered the major population group. In the constitution of Malaysia, as Asmah (1983: 79) records “. . . the Malays are defined as people who speak the Malay language as their mother tongue, lead the Malay way of life and profess the Islamic faith.” 2 Pondok and Madrasa started to teach Arabic and Islamic culture to the Malay community. Students from all parts of Malaysia. Pondoks and madrasas are usually built by well to do Muslims. Students either depend on themselves to earn a living or live on rich Muslims’ donations.

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written Arabic (1987); a paper presented by Ibrahim contrasting Arabic and BM (1992); Soufi’s analysis of errors made by students of the IIUM3 Matriculation Center (1992); and a contrastive study by Rahmat highlighting areas of similarities and differences between Arabic and BM.

2. The Present Study The target of this study is fourfold: the first aim is to examine the types of errors made by Malay students in the written Arabic in the use of the definite article ( al) and preposition, inasmuch as these two elements are most problematic to Malay learners, as found by researchers and observed by teachers of Arabic. The second aim is to demonstrate the propensity or inclination of students to commit errors. Unlike other studies relevant to this area, the third purpose is to show statistically whether or not the difference in frequency of errors in these two aspects is significant. The fourth aim is to trace the possible sources of errors.

3. The Subjects The subjects of this study are selected from undergraduate students who study Arabic language and literature as a major or minor subject in the undergraduate degree program. The Program is run by the Department of Arabic Language and Literature and concentrates on language skills, Arabic literature, introduction to linguistics, and other related subjects. The majority of Malay students have attended Islamic religious schools where they were extensively exposed to Arabic. In contrast, other students came from secular schools and were not exposed to Arabic prior to their Matriculation studies at the International Islamic University (Malaysia). Arabic is the primary medium of instruction for the program, and English is employed as the secondary medium. Students majoring in Arabic must complete 54 credit hours in core courses and 18 credit hours in supporting courses. 3

International Islamic University Malaysia.

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All students majoring in Arabic are required to minor in Islamic Revealed Knowledge and Heritage. As such, they study all minor courses in English, thus fulfilling the English language requirements of the Kulliyah. Students who minor in Arabic are majoring in Revealed Knowledge or Human Science. Students are required to take at least 60% of their courses in Arabic and 40% in English. Students who major or minor in Arabic must sit for an Arabic placement test where they must achieve an exemption at the highest level. The sample for this study comprises of 100 Malay students. Sixtyseven are female and thirty-three male. Ninety-three students are majoring in Arabic and the rest are taking Arabic as a minor subject. Average age of this group ranges between twenty-three and twenty-six years. On average, the subjects have studied Arabic for eight years. BM is the mother tongue of all students who participated in this study, and English is their second language. The subjects were studying in religious schools before joining IIU. They studied some subjects in Arabic, such as Had ‘Prophets’ Traditions’, tafsir ‘Qur an Interpretation’, fiqh ‘Jurisprudence’, tajw d ‘Qur an Intonation’ etc.

4. Tools and Procedures The data for this study is collected from free compositions. Each subject was asked, at different times during the first semester of the 1992–1993 academic year, to write two free compositions. In December 1992 the students were requested to write on one of the following: i.

axs yatun u jibt bih ‘A person you have a high opinion of ’

ii. iii.

a - ab bu wal mukhddir tu ‘Youth and Drugs’ a w lu al-muslim na al-yauma ‘the state of Muslims today’

All assignments were done in class. The time allocated for each session was one hour, the same amount of time the students were normally allocated for writing. There were a total of 200 written compositions, the length of each ranged between 350 and 450 words.

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EA was utilized to investigate the students’ errors. Analysis was undertaken in the three stages suggested by Corder (1974): the recognition, description and explanation of error sources. In the error identification stage, the following was done: i. Each assignment was read twice in order to acquaint the researcher with the student’s writing style. ii. Grammatical errors were underlined with red ball-point-pen. iii. The plausible interpretation of each error was placed above it. iv. Each erroneous sentence and its plausible interpretation were transferred to a 3 × 5” ruled error card. The students’ written words are considered errors when they’re found to deviate from contemporary standard Arabic. anna wu al- arab ‘The Arabic Grammar’ books were used as references for error identification and description. The following criteria were used in grading the students’ errors: i Ambiguous errors due to handwriting were ignored. ii. Since signs of declension, other than letters, do not appear in Arabic handwriting, they are totally ignored because it is impossible to differentiate which sign the student employs. When the corpus of data was established, the errors were manually computed and classified into the two main categories of definite article and prepositions. Following that, each category was subcategorized; this is a necessary action if error analysis is to be useful to the teacher (Meziani 1984). There are two statistical methods being applied in this study. The first is known as descriptive statistics, which is used to summarize the data obtained. There are two methods to describe the data: numerical and graphical methods. The second statistical method is quantitative statistical analysis. Descriptive statistical analysis was employed to sum up the frequency and distribution of errors per subject and to display the students’ propensity to commit each type of error. The calculation of error frequency (or the number of times an error occurs) is based on the absolute frequency of errors where a comprehensive analysis of all errors is made. The same mode of presentation is used on the subcategory level. In order to give a coherent picture of the distribution of errors amongst subjects, the data is presented in diagrammatic form. The researcher claims that this type of data presentation is beneficial to

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language educators because it provides considerable insight into the distribution of errors per subject and gives a real image of students’ performance. It also classifies students into categories through which the teacher can anticipate where the problem lies. The propensity or general tendency of students to commit errors can be seen in the display of errors presented by these diagrams. The teacher can utilize the facts presented thus in order to construct more effective remedial work. With regard to quantitative statistics, a pair sample t-test is used here to find out whether or not the difference between the types of errors made by the subjects of this study is significant. The t-test is used to test the null hypothesis (Ho) and the alternative hypothesis (Hi) and from the t-value a decision is made as to whether or not the null and alternative hypotheses are accepted. These hypotheses are: there is no statistically significant difference between the two variables. Hi: MD =/= O there is a statistically significant difference between the two variables. Ho: MD = O

If the t-value is greater than 2.0, this indicates that there is a significant difference between the two variables. However, if the t value is lower than 2.0 this shows that there is no significant difference between the two variables. The hypotheses of this study are: Ho 1 There is no significant difference between errors in the definite article and errors in prepositions. Hi 1 There is a statistically significant difference between errors in the definite article and errors in prepositions.

5. Description of Errors In each area, examples of errors are provided for description and discussion. The subjects’ original utterances and their transliteration are retained. If part of a sentence is needed to elaborate an error, it is sometimes retained. It is worth mentioning that in transliteration

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of the subjects’ original sentences, case endings signs of declinable nouns and verbs are not marked. This is followed by interpretation and transliteration of the interpreted sentence. Each transliteration is put between brackets. That is followed by the translation of the interpreted sentence, which is usually written between inverted commas. The English equivalents provided for the Arabic examples are literal translations; hence they may not stand as standard English. This form of presentation was employed by Safe-Stan (1990) and is intended to make explanation clear. Whenever there is example from the Holy Qur an used for explanation, the translations of meanings of the example are taken from the edition of The Holy Qur an English Translation of The Meanings and Commentary, which is produced by the Presidency of Islamic Researches, IFTA, Call and Guidance, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Each type of error is further elaborated by mentioning the frequency of its occurrence. Sometimes, one example is presented for a number of errors if that example is found to represent that group of errors. In the course of analyzing the students’ writings, the researcher has come across factually incorrect sentences. No attempt was made to correct the facts, as the researcher was more concerned with the students’ grammatical errors. The final stage in the analysis of grammatical errors is the attribution of these errors to their sources. As mentioned in a preceding chapter, linguists have identified many factors as being responsible for the occurrence of errors. In the relevant part of this study the subjects’ errors are traced to their most likely sources.

6. Results and Discussion The subjects’ total errors amount to 1116. This gives an average of 11.16 per subject. The following tables show the distribution of errors by category.

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Table 1. Distribution of Subjects’ Errors in the Areas Investigated No

Category

Occurrence of Errors

Percentage

The Definite article

591

52.9

Prepositions

525

47.1

Total

1116

100

Table 2. Distributions of Subjects’ Errors in the Definite Article No

Category

Occurrence of Errors

Percentage

Addition of ( al) to the first part of the construct phrase

162

27.4

Addition of ( al) to the common nouns

109

18.4

Omission of ( al al- ahd yyah)

094

16

Addition of ( al) to proper names

065

11

Omission of ( al al-jins yyah)

045

07.6

Omission of ( al) of the second part of the construct phrase

034

05.8

Omission of necessary ( al) in adjectives

033

05.6

Addition of unnecessary ( al) to adjectives

030

05

Omission of the redundant ( al) in proper names

019

03.2

Total

591

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Table 3. Distributions of the Subjects’ Errors in Prepositions No

Occurrence of Errors

Category

Percentage

Omission of necessary prepositions

213

40.6

Addition of unnecessary prepositions

173

32.9

Wrong selection

139

26.5

Total

525

6%

6%

8%

5%

100

Addition of ( al) to the first part of the construct phrase

3%

11% 27%

Addition of ( al) to the common noun Omission of ( al al- adhiyyah) Addition of ( al) to proper names

16%

Omission of ( al al-jinsiyyah)

18%

Figure 1. Errors in the Definite Article

26%

Omission of necessary prepositions

Addition of unnecessary prepositions 33% 41%

Figure 2. Errors in Prepositions

Wrong selection

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It is necessary to point out here that a lower frequency of errors does not indicate a less difficult area for subjects studying Arabic as a foreign language. Or that more frequent errors indicate more problematic areas for subjects. Rather, a low frequency of errors may simply mean that, within the corpus, the point that shows less frequency of error occurs a fewer number of times when compared with other points.

7. Distribution of Errors per Subject The table below presents a summary of the total number of errors made by the subjects in this study.

Table 4. Summary of Error Distribution Per Subject Category Definite Article Preposition Total

Mean

Median

Standard Deviation

5.91 5.25

6 5

4 2.8688

11.16

11

6.8688

The following figures display the distribution of errors per subject: As Figure 3 shows, the largest number of students had between 25 and 29 errors, a total of 22 students. A few students had more than 40 errors, and only one student had 48 errors. The mean number of errors is 22.33, therefore more than 50% of students fell bellow the mean. From Figure 4 we can see that the mean number of errors is 5.91 and that 52% of the subjects are above this number. Twenty four students made 2 or 3 errors in using the definite article, and 23 students made 6 or 7 errors. The figure also shows that one student made 20 errors, a fact that demonstrates that the student is lagging behind the rest of the class in this concern. Figure 6 shows that all students have a tendency to commit errors in the areas investigated, giving a propensity of 1.0. This is the highest possible propensity, and indicates that all subjects are likely to commit errors in the grammatical areas analyzed in the study.

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142 25

22 20 17

18

17

15 12 10

5

5

5 3

0

1 0 0 5–7 10–14 15–19 20–24 25–29 30–34 35–39 40–44 48 Figure 3. A Display of Students’ Errors in the Two Areas

25

24 23

20

15

14 12

10

10 7

5

4

4 2

0 0–1

2–3

4–5

6–7

8–9

10–11 12–13 14–15 16–20

Figure 4. A Display of Students’ Errors in the Definite Article

an error analysis of malay students’ written arabic 25

25

22

23

20 17 15 freq 10 7 5

4 1

1

0 0–1

2–3

4–5

6–7

8–9

10–11 12–13 14–15

Figure 5. A Display of Students’ Errors in Prepositions

100

100

99 98

98 97 96 95

95 94 93 92

Two Areas

Definite Article

Preposition

Figure 6. Students’ Propensity

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However, if each area is examined separately, the numbers differ and it becomes apparent that 95% of the group is likely to err in using the definite article and 98% will err in using prepositions. The Figure shows the propensity to commit errors in the use of the definite article and prepositions, as 0.95 and 0.98 respectively.

8. Test of Significance Ho 1 There is no significant difference between errors in the definite article and errors in prepositions Hi There is a statistically significant difference between errors in the definite article and errors in prepositions

Table 5. Paired Sample Test between Errors in Using the Definite Article & Errors in Using Prepositions Definite article

Prepositions

Difference

Mean

SD

Se

T value

591

525

66

0.66

4.949

0.495

1.33

Table 5 shows that the t value is 1.33. This indicates that the difference between errors in the use of the definite article and prepositions has only a .05 level of significance. Therefore, the null hypothesis is accepted and the alternative hypothesis rejected. Previous error analysis studies of Malay students’ written Arabic and contrastive analyses (including lists of common Arabic words) confirm the present result by finding a slight difference between errors in the definite article and errors in prepositions. Abukhudairi (1987) found the ratio of error in definite articles to errors in prepositions to be 36.7:25.3.

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9. Examples of Errors 9.1

The Definite Article

Addition of lA ( al) to the First Part of the Construct Phrase 1. . . . (. . . f "al— d al-fi r) // . . . (f di alfi ri) ‘. . . on Eid El-Fitr.’ 2. . . . (. . . yu ayir ala al- iqtiS d ad-dawlah) // . . . (. . . yu ayiru ala iqtiS di ad-dawlati) ‘. . . it affects the economy of the state.’ 3. (darasa f "al-j mi ah al- azhar) // (darasa f j mi ati al- azhari) ‘He studied at Al-Azhar University.’ 4. (huwa "ar-ra s balad ) // (huwa ra su balad ) ‘He is the president of my country . . .’ 5. (l ikr ha f "ad-d n ’l- isl m) (l ikr ha f d ni al- isl mi) ‘No compulsion in Islam.’ 6. . . . ( al-Huk mah kalant n) // . . . (. . . Hukumatu kelant n) ‘. . . the government of Kelantan.’ Addition of lA ( al) to the Common Noun 7. (. . . ya¶hab na min "al-bayt ila "al-bayat) // (. . . ya¶hab na min baytin ila baytin) ‘They go from a house to another.’ 8. (. . . kul "al-muslim yusar bi h ¶a al- d) // (. . . kullu muslimin yusarru bi h ¶a al- d ) ‘. . . every Muslim will be pleased with this Eid.’ 9. ( al-xa ib sayursil "al-wafd yatakwwan min w lidayhi wa aqrib ihi) // (- al-x ibu sayursilu wafdan yatakkawwanu min w lidayhi wa aqrib ihi) ‘The fiance’ will send a delegation consisting of his parents and relatives.’ 10. (ya na bid n ?al-kar mah) // (ya na bid ni kar matin) ‘They live in degradation’ 11. (waqa a ixtiy ruhu ala "al- imar ah min abn sa d) // (waqa a ixtiy ruhu ala imra atin min bani sa din) ‘He had selected a woman from Bani Sa d clan.’

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Omission of ¯Id˙™LalA ( al al- ahd yyah) 12. (yuqaww h ¶a ^ mu tamar al- iqtisad) // (yuqawwi h ¶a al-mu tamaru al- iqtisada) ‘This conference enhances the economy.’ 13. . . . (h ¶ihi hiyya ^ axS yyah allat : . . .) // . (h ¶ihi h yya a - axS yyatu allati . . .) ‘This is the distinguished person who. . . .’ 14. (yukarrir na h ¶ihi ^ kalimah kay ran) // (yukarrir na h ¶ihi al-kalimata kay ran) ‘They repeat this word frequently.’ 15. ( inna ^ ras la Salla all h alayhi wa sallama miy l jayyid ) // ( inna ar-ras la Salla all hu alayhi wa sallama miy lun jayyidun) ‘Allah’s Apostle, Allah’s blessing and peace be upon him, is a good example.’ 16. (sayantaqil na ila ^ manzil ^ jadid alla¶:i banathu al-Huk mah lahum) // (sayantaqiluna ila al-manzili al-jadidi alla¶ banathu al-Huk matu lahum) ‘They will move to the new house the government had built for them.’ 17. ( al-Haj huwa ^ rukn ^ x mis f alis:lam) // ( al-Hajju huwa ar-ruknu alx misu f al- isl mi) ‘The pilgrimage is the fifth pillar of Islam.’ Addition of lA ( al) to Proper Names 18. (ya na f al-m l zyah) // (ya na f m l zyah) ‘They live in Malaysia.’ 19. (yaS m na ahr ar-ramaD n) // (yaS m na ahra ramaD na) ‘They observe the fast during the month of Ramadan.’ 20. ( raka f ma rikat al-badr) // ( raka f ma rikati badrin) ‘He participated in the Badr Battlefield.’ 21. (f al-makkah kay r min as-sila ) // (f makkata kay run min as-sila i) ‘There are many goods available in Mecca.’ 22. (i taGala bi at-tij rah li al-xad jah) // (i taGala bi at-tijarati li xad jata) ‘He worked for Khadijah.’

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Omission of ¯£ß¡ΔLalA ( al al-jins yyah) 23. . . ( indam i tadda alayhi ^ a¶ b h jara) // ( indam i tadda alayhi al a¶ bu h jara . .) ‘When torture became more sever, he migrated.’ 24. (ya¶hab ^ Hujj j ila makkah) // (ya¶habu al-hujj ju ila makkata) ‘Pilgrims go to Mecca.’ Omission of lA (‘al) of the Second Part of the Construct Phrase 25. . . (. . na r ^ da wah al- isl m yyah) // .... (. . na ru ad-da wati al- isl m yyati).’. . the propagation of the Islamic call.’ 26. (ya¶hab na ba da ^ Sal h ila man zilihim) // . (ya¶hab na ba da aS-Sal ti ila man zilihim) ‘They go to their houses after prayer.’ Omission of necessary lA ( al) in adjective 27. (wa qad akkada all h subH nahu wa ta la f kit bihi ^ kar m) // (wa qad akkada all hu subH nahu wa ta la f kit bihi alkar mi) ‘Allah, to Whom be ascribed all perfection and majesty, confirmed in his holy book’ 28. ( akmala dir sathu ^ ulyah) // .. ( akmala dir satahu al- ulyah) ‘He has completed his higher studies.’ 29. (lahum luGatuhum wa yaq fatuhum ^ x SSah // (lahum luGatuhum wa yaq fatuhum alx SSatu) ‘They have their own languages and culture.’ Addition of Unnecessary lA ( al) to Adjective 30. (qara tu kutuban al- isl m yyah) // (qar atu kutuban isl m yyatan) ‘I have read Islamic books.’ 31. ( al-Haj mu tamar al- isl m ) // ( al-Hajju mu tamarun islamiyyun) ‘The pilgrimage is an Islamic conference.’ Omission of the Redundant lA (‘al) in Proper Names 32. @ . . . (. . . min ^ s d n ) // @ s d n ).’ . . . from Sudan ’

. . (. . . min as-

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33.

(¶ahaba ila ^ azhar) // azhari ‘He went to Al- Azhar.’

9.2

Preposition

(¶ahaba ila al-

Omission of Necessary Preposition 34. . . . . (. . . yu min na ^ hu) // . . (. . . yu min na bihi) ‘. . . they believe in him.’ 35. . . . (. . . yaHS l na ^ an-nuq d min azzuww r) // . . . (. . . yaHSul na ala annuq di min az-zuww ri) ‘. . they receive money from visitors. 36. (k na m hiran f riy Dat ad-dif ^ annafs) // (k na m hiran f riy Dati addif i an an-nafsi) ‘He was proficient in the arts of self-defense.’ 37. . . . . (. . . wa yaz r na ila al-makan a ar f ) // . . . (. . . wa yaz r na al-mak na a ar fa) ‘. . and they visit the holy place’. Addition of Unnecessary Preposition 38. ( al-muxaddir t ayDan tusabbib ila almawt) // ( al-muXaddir tu ayDan tusbbibu al-mawta) ‘Drug abuse causes death also.’ 39. (tak nu akyar min al-man zil maft Hah f ayy m / al- d) // (tak nu akyaru al-man zili maft Hatan f ayy mi al- di) ‘Most of the houses are open during the days of Eid.’ 40. . . . . (. . . wa yuHsin mu malah ma a zawjatihi) // . . (. . . wa yuHsinu mu malata zawjatihi).’. . and he treats his wife well.’ 41. . . . . (. . . yans na an amw lihim.) // ... (. . . yans na amw lahum) ‘. . . they forget about their money.’ 42. . . . (. . . yumma bad yuHallil na an almu kilah) // (. . . yumma bada yuHallil na almu kilata) ‘. . then they started the analysis of the problem.’ Wrong Selection of Prepositions 43. (tu Ta ilayhim an-nuq d) // lahum an-nuq du) ‘Money is given to them.’

(tu Ta

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46

47.

48.

49. 50.

51.

52.

53. 54.

55. 56. 57.

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( al-Haj furSah ala al-muslim na kay yata raf ) // ( al-Hajju furSatun li almuslim na kay yata raf ) ‘Pilgrimage is an opportunity for Muslims to know each other’ . . . (. . . yuj hid na bi sab l all h ) // ... (. . . yuj hid na f sab li all hi) ‘. . they fought for the sake of Allah.’ (yaS m al-muslim na imtiy lan bi aw mir all h subH nahu wa ta la) (yaS mu al-mulim na imtiy lan li aw miri all hi subH nahu wa ta la) ‘Muslims fast in order to carry out the orders of Allah, to Whom be ascribed all perfection and majesty’. . . . (. . . yuwazzi na an-nuq d ila al-yat ma) // . . . (yuwazzi na an-nuq da ala al-yat mah) ‘They divide the money amongst the orphans.’ (h wa miyluhu min Sif tihi) // (huwa miyluhu f Sif tihi) ‘He is similar to him in characteristics’. (tatkawwan m l zyah an ajn s muxtalifah) // (tatakawwanu m l zyah min ajn sin muxtalifatin) ‘Malaysia consists of various races’ (qad na ara al- isl m li h ¶a al- lam) // (qad na ara al- isl ma f h ¶a al- lami) ‘He had spread Islam all over the world.’ . . (. . . qabla an yufakkir ila h ¶ihi almu kilah) // (. . . qabla an yufakkir f h ¶ihi al-mu kilati) ‘. . before they think on how to solve this problem.’ (sawfa atakallam bi d al-fiTr) // (sawfa atakllamu an di al-fiTri) ‘I will talk about Eid Al-Fitr.’ (ya¶hab na ila j ranihim ma a Talab alafw minhum) // (ya¶hab na ila j ranihim li Talabi al- afwi minhum) ‘They go to their neighbours’ houses seeking forgiveness.’ (tu Ta alayhim an-nuq d) // (tu Ta lahum an-nuq du) ‘Money is given to them’. (taSbir an al-ma kil) // (taSbiru ala alma kili) ‘She bears patiently the problems.’ (w Sala dir satahu ila miSr) // (w Sala dir satahu f miSra) ‘He continued his studies in Egypt.’

150 58.

59.

60.

61.

62. 63.

64.

65.

chapter nine ( al- aTf l yan l na an-nuq d f Tar q az-ziy rah) // ( al- aTf lu yan l na annuq da an Tar qi az-ziy rati) ‘Children obtain money by means of visiting neighbours’ and relatives’ houses.’ (yazdaHim al-muslim na ila al-masajid) // (yazdaHimu al-muslim na f al-masajidi) ‘Mosques are crowded with Muslims.’ . . . . (. . . . indam nufakkir s ah anhu) // . . . . (. . . indam nufakkiru s atan f hi) ‘. . . when we think, for a while, about it.’ ( j a an-n s wa min ixtil f ajn sihim ila makkah) // ( j a an-n su wa bi ixtil f ajn sihim ila makkata) ‘People, who belong to different races, came to Mecca.’ . . . (. . . u jabu alayha) // . . . (. . . u jabu biha) . . ‘. . . I am highly impressed by her.’ ( al-Hamd lill h alla¶ amaran li ad alHaj) // ( al-Hamdu lill hi alla¶ amaran biad i al-Hajji) ‘Praise be to Allah who ordered us to perform the pilgrimage.’ (. . . yaS ub lahum an yatruk h ) // ... (. . . yaS ubu alayhim an yatrukuha) ‘. . . it is difficult for them to leave it.’ ( al-Haj f zaman ar-ras l yaxtalif min al-Haj f yawmin h ¶a) // ( al-Hajju f zamani ar-rasuli yaxtalifu an al-Hajji f yawmin h ¶a) ‘Pilgrimage at the Prophet’s time differs from when it was at the Messenger’s time.’

10. Explanation of the Sources of Error Attribution of errors to their sources is the last stage of error analysis. In this stage, an answer for the question why are errors committed is pursued. Arani (1986: 143) states, “Since L2 errors can be caused by a variety of factors, the explanation of errors is by and large speculative. In other words, the fact of the matter is that the error analyst can never be one hundred percent sure about what in fact causes the occurrence of error.”

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As such, attributing an error to a certain source is not taken as absolute fact. Here, subjects’ errors are traced to their most likely sources. 10.1

The Definite Article

Definite article errors can be attributed to sources such as: BM interference, overgeneralization, borrowing, and learners’ ignorance correct application of the definite article ( al). In BM there is neither an equivalent to the Arabic definite article, ( al), nor to the English definite article, ‘the’. Instead, BM uses the demonstrative pronouns ini or itu in cases of definition. Sulaiman (1990). For example: Rumah itu baru: may stand for ( al-baytu jad dun) ‘The house is new’ or (¶ lika al-baytu jad dun) ‘That house is new.’ The subjects have transferred these characteristics to the learning of Arabic; failing to insert the definite article ( al) where it is needed, as in #17, 18, 19, 20, 28, and 31 (see Appendix 3). Some errors in this area might be attributed to interference of the subjects’ second language, English. Examples of this are found in (s d n, #32). Overgeneralization is seen in examples where learners tried to utilize previously learned TL4 materials in new situations where they are not applicable. Errors occurring as a result are either the insertion of an unnecessary ( al) or omission of a necessary ( al). For example, learners have inserted ( al) incorrectly in the first part of the construct state in examples 1 to 6, because they have overgeneralized that since a definite article is prefixed to the second part of the construct state, it should be prefixed to the first part. The students have also overgeneralized in the addition of an unnecessary ( al) to proper names, as shown in examples 18 to 22. In the Arabic language proper names are defined by default, and therefore have no definite article attached to them, though some proper

4

L stands for the target language.

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names such as ( as-samaw al) are preceded by the definite article. Ibn Hisham (1960) considered the ( al) attached to proper names as (z ida) ‘redundant’ because it has no function. Overgeneralization may also be the reason for the errors of omission of ( al) in the second part of the construct phrase, where students could have assumed that since the first part of the construct phrase has no definite article attached, the second part shouldn’t have one. Some errors are attributable to a learner’s incomplete knowledge of Arabic grammar, particularly the application of the adjective rules pertaining to the definite article. Adjectives must agree with the nouns in cases of definition. Therefore, if a noun has a definite article, its adjective must have one as well. Learners’ weakness in Arabic is also apparent in the faulty addition of a definite article to the common noun in examples from #7 to 11. The underlined nouns should be indefinite as they did not point to a specific noun. Some errors occur due to the impact of borrowing from BM. Examples of errors occurring due to this are found in examples where students have dropped out the necessary definite article in the following nouns: (Sal h, #26), ( azhar, #33), and (da wah, #25). These items are transferred by the subjects from Arabic to the indefinite form in BM, then back to Arabic in the same form. 10.2

Prepositions

As in the definite article, errors in prepositions can be attributed to factors such as interference of the learners’ mother tongue BM, interference of the English language, learners’ incomplete knowledge of how prepositions are applied, and the inherent difficulties of particles in Arabic language and false analogy. Interference of BM is clearly shown in some examples where the learner carries over the characteristics of his own language to the learning of Arabic. For example in #36, the student has omitted the preposition ( an) ‘about’ because it has no equivalent in the following Malay written sentence: Dia pakar dalam seni mempertahankan diri. ‘he was good in self defence.’ One of the reasons Malays carry over from BM is that in many cases for two or three Arabic prepositions there is only one counterpart. For example, the counterparts of the preposition dari as taken

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from Kamus Pustaka (1992) are (min) and ( an) and (bi) and (ma a) are counterparts of the Malay preposition dengan. The student will therefore try to substitute one preposition for all its Arabic counterparts, regardless of rules and cases governing the use of the prepositions. It is worth mentioning here that adoption of the Grammar and Translation Method of teaching Arabic has reinforced this error. The subjects have employed this strategy in selecting the wrong prepositions in #43 to 64. The false analogy factor is shown in #34, 35, 37, 38, 39, 41, and 42. For example, in #34 the learner thought (yu min na) ‘they believe in’ is the same as (yuSaddiq na) ‘they believe’. So he hypothesized that (yu min na) ‘they believe in’ like (yuSaddiq na) ‘they believe’ has no preposition. In #37 the student thought (yaz r na) ‘they visit’ as the same as (ya¶hab na) ‘they go’, hence the student assumed that just as one can write (ya¶hab na ila) ‘they go to’, one can also write (yaz r na ila) ‘they visit to’. The same strategy was applied to (yuS fiH na) ‘they shake hands’ and (yataS faH na) ‘they shake hands together’, and (yu hid na) ‘they watch’ and (yanÎur na ila) ‘they look at’. In #39, due to the similarity between ( akyar) ‘most’ and (kay r) ‘many’, the student has mistakenly inserted (min) after ( akyar). In #86 the student added ( ila) to the verb (w Sala), because he thinks that this preposition can be put after (wasal) ‘pursue’ as it is put after (w Sala) ‘arrived’. In #40, the learner has employed the same strategy, because he was misled by the false analogy between (ta mul) ‘to deal’ and (mu malah) ‘treatment’; the former is usually followed by (ma a) ‘with’, which led the student to attempt the same. This coincides with what Richards (1990: 167) notes “The learner, encountering a particular preposition with one type of verb, attempts by analogy to use the same preposition with similar verbs.” The inherent difficulty of prepositions in Arabic may cause errors. In Arabic, according to Ibn Malik (1983), there are twenty prepositions, each of which has many meanings. He stated that, for example, (min) has seven meanings, (li) has twelve, (bi) has twelve, (fi) has six, ( ala) has four, and ( an) has four. In

( Alf yyat Ibn M lik) the preposition

(bi) means:

154 i. ii. iii. iv. v.

vi. vii.

viii. ix.

x. xi.

xii.

chapter nine ( al- isti nah) ‘expressing instrumentality or means’ (katabtu bi al-qalami) ‘I wrote with the pen’ ( at-ta diyah) ‘transitivity’ (yaHtafil na bi al- i:di) ‘They celebrate the id’ ( at-ta w D) ‘substitution of a whole for a whole’ (bi tuka h ¶a bih ¶a) ‘I shall sell you this in return for this.’ ( al- ilS q) ‘attachment’ ( amsaktu bizaydin) ‘I hold Zayd’ ( at-tab D) ‘substitution of the part for the whole’ ( aynan ya rabu bih ib du all hi) ‘A Fountain where Devotees of Allah Do drink’ 6/76 ( al-muS Haba) ‘accomany’ (wa qad daxal bil kufri) ‘But in fact they enter with a disbelief ’ 5/61. ( al-muj waza) ‘transgression’ ( is al bihi xab ra ) ‘Ask thou, then, about Him Of any acquainted with such things’ 25/59. ( aÎ-Îarf yya) ‘adverbial’ (wa m kunta bij nib al-Garb ) ‘Thou was not on the Western Side’ 28/44 ( al-badal) ‘substitution’ (m yassrrun ann ahidtu badra bil aqabah) ‘I would not have been happier if I had taken part in the Badr battle instead of taking part in the aqaba pledge.’ ( al- isti l ) ‘elevation’ (man in ta manhu biqinT rin) ‘Are some who, if entrusted With a hoard of gold.’ 3/75. ( as-sabab yya) ‘reasoning’ (fabim naqDihim miyaq hum la ann hum) ‘But because of their breach of their Covenant, We Cursed them’ 5/13. ( at-ta k d) ‘emphasis’ (wa kaf bill hi ah dan) ‘And enough is Allah For a witness’ 4/79.

In conclusion, this chapter presented an analysis and review of data categorized on the basis of error types. The data, based on the response of subjects (learners) to certain written tasks in Arabic, is subjected to a thorough quantitative linguistic analysis related to notions and concept frameworks taken from Error Analysis.

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11. Conclusion Malay students show high tendency to committing errors in these areas. However, the distribution of students’ errors varies; some students have a low number of errors, others have a large number. The distribution of errors per subject shows that all students have problems in using the definite article and preposition. As the t test shows, there is no significant difference in the frequency of errors in these two items. This indicates that they have the same level of difficulty to Malay students. The study shows that Malay students’ errors in Arabic are attributable to the sources of interference of BM, overgeneralization, inherent difficulties in the Arabic language, students’ incomplete knowledge, and the methods used for teaching. Other minor sources include carelessness, tiredness, and exposure of the subjects to colloquial Arabic false analogy and Arabic loan-words in BM.

CHAPTER TEN

VERBAL REPORT DATA AND L2 READING COMPREHENSION: THE CASE OF THE THINK ALOUD TECHNIQUE Mahmoud Abdalla

In this paper, I examine and compare the reading performance of four university students from China and the United Sates of America. This involves examination of the influence of cultural background on students’ comprehension of two expository texts on the Chinese New Year and Thanksgiving Festivals, the way they monitor their comprehension, and the strategies used to construct main ideas. In addition, the influence of the think aloud technique on recall and comprehension will be examined. Following are the hypotheses of the study: 1. Chinese students will recall more of the familiar text (Chinese New Year) than American students and less of the unfamiliar text (Thanksgiving). 2. American students will recall more of the familiar text (Thanksgiving) than Chinese students and less of the unfamiliar text (Chinese New Year). 3. Chinese native speakers will be able to make more accurate predictions than American native speakers relating to the Chinese text. 4. American native speakers will be able to make more accurate predictions than Chinese native speakers relating to the American text. 5. The discourse type (collection of descriptions) will affect quantity and quality of idea units recalled. Before further information is provided about this research study, I will revise the use of the think aloud method in L1 and L2 reading comprehension research. Reading is a hidden process that often goes unnoticed in the classroom. It is complex and involves several cognitive processes that cannot be directly observed and thus it is a difficult task for psychologists

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to choose an appropriate method to examine it. The difficulty is due to the fact that all the psychological processes important to comprehension are internal to the mind. Based on the assumption that good readers are aware of the cognitive activities that occur during reading and that they realize that reading is a problem-solving process, the thinking aloud technique was believed to be a useful research tool for studying the cognitive processes in reading comprehension. The think aloud technique, developed by Newell and Simon (1972), has been used to study the reading process by a number of L1 and L2 researchers (Olson, Duffy, & Meck 1984). Using the think aloud method in first and second language research surely helps us see whether L1 and L2 readers use similar processes and resources for solving comprehension difficulties they perceive. The think aloud method also helps get insght into the control processes, usually referred to as metacognition. The cognitive processes involve thinking about what one is doing while reading; an ability that requires the individual to observe himself or herself. Despite its limitation, the think aloud method is still considered a good tool for understanding the learning process. Loxterman et al. (1994: 364) conclude that the effect of merely asking students to stop and reflect suggests that thinking aloud holds promise. The usefulness of the technique also led Ann Raimes (1985) to say that thinking aloud was simply too good a tool not to be used.

Main Idea Construction The schema theoretic approach views reading as the active construction of meaning. The reader integrates new knowledge derived from text with his/her background knowledge in ways that make sense. The schema sometimes does not account for incoming information and therefore is either rejected or modified and the search for a more adequate schema starts. So, monitoring one’s comprehension will eventually lead to effective reading. Monitoring and selfregulation of cognition require continuous evaluation of one’s understanding of a text. It also requires readers to take corrective actions when they encounter comprehension problems. One of the major skills in the process of constructing meaning presented above is how to construct a main idea. This becomes a

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very difficult task, particularly when the main idea of a text is not explicitly stated. In such cases, the reader tries to construct a statement to represent the main idea, as it is difficult for him/her to select it from the surrounding sentences. Although Van Dijk and Kintsch’s (1983) suggest that the macroprocess of constructing a main idea statement usually takes place automatically, Johnson and Afflerbach (1985) believe that main idea construction may be achieved through the use of one or more cognitive strategies. Though not ignoring the role of automatic construction process, they identified four other strategies that are used to construct main idea statements. These strategies are: draft-and-revision, topic/comment, initial hypothesis, and listing (for further information about the rules developed for these strategies see Afflerbach 1990, pp. 31–46). The researchers reported that when reading difficult texts, expert readers tend to use mediated, nonautomatic comprehension strategies to construct main idea statements rather than constructing them automatically.

The Subjects The subjects who participated in this study were university students who study Arabic as a foreign language at Washington University, St. Louis. All subjects were third and fourth year students rated as good readers by their instructors. It was important to guarantee a sample of subjects with almost the same reading abilities and thus have a wide range of strategies, enabling the researcher to make useful comparisons without being biased against one particular level. The instructors reported that their judgments were based on the students’ scores on regular reading examinations and the instructors’ observations of the students’ performance on reading tasks conducted in class.

Material Two reading passages are used, one reflects the content domain of the readers’ background of the Chinese students (a Chinese culture topic on Chinese New Year) and the other reflects the content domain of the readers’ background of the American students (an American culture topic on Thanksgiving).

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The Chinese culture passage was taken from a book written by Wolfram Eberhard, 1972 and the American culture passage was taken from a book titled “The American Book of the Days” by Gouglas, G. W. (1937). The two passages were translated and modified by the researcher and were revised by two referees who confirmed that the translation is close to the original text. They are of approximately equal length (Chinese passage 465 words and American passage 436 words), and contain nearly the same number of T-units (31 T-units in the Chinese passage and 27 T-units in the American passage). I sliced the two passages into T-units and three raters who are specialized in AFL reading comprehension and text processing checked the slicing procedure followed and agreed with it. Only one rater suggested that the Chinese text should be sliced into 34 Tunits instead of thirty one. The researcher and the other two raters thought that there is no need to slice T-units 16, and 24 since they are not extensions of the main T-units they are attached to and don’t carry new information. A T-unit is the “shortest grammatically allowable sentences into which a theme could be segmented. Each unit is grammatically capable of being considered a sentence. A T-unit (minimal terminal unit) refers to the unit that contains a main clause and any other subordinate clauses attached to it. A clause consists of subjects (or coordinated subjects) and a finite verb phrase (or coordinated verbs or phrases). The T-unit index has the advantage of preserving all the subordination written by students and the coordination between words and phrases and subordinate clauses” (Hunt 1965: 20–21) On the Smog readability formula by Mclaughlin (1969), the texts were determined to be at the thirteen and fourteenth grade reading levels respectively (Smog grading for the Chinese passage is 13.19 and for the American passage 14.17)

Procedure Students were given clear instructions of how the task would be conducted. The instructions were both in English and Arabic to ensure that subjects understood the objectives and stages of the exercise. Subjects were asked to read the first paragraph of the text, covering the rest with a blank sheet. The subjects were asked to read at

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their individual reading rates to find out what it said about the topic. In addition, they were not permitted to refer back to the text or write any notes. Once the students finished reading the first paragraph, teachers asked them to report what they understood in as much detail as they could. The interviewers interfered from time to time, providing hints and clues to enable students to remember the events and reflect more on what they had read. These clues did not provide subjects with any content information; they were meant to encourage those who are hesitant to talk and to give them an opportunity to provide more details and explanations. In other words, the purpose was to maximize subjects’ talk in order to obtain a rich data sample. The interviewers’ interference was very limited and the clues were almost similar in the four interviews. These clues included long pauses and the use of phrase and questions such as what did you understand? what do you expect in the next paragraph? what else do you remember? any thing new? is that all? any other comments? would you like to add anything? such as what? Students were then asked to report their expectations of what was coming next (in the second paragraph). This process was repeated until the whole text was finished. The verbal data obtained from each subject was recorded on tape and later transcribed and analyzed by the researcher. The recording took place in a room provided by the university and two instructors conducted the interviews. Each student was asked to fill in the questionnaire after finishing the think-aloud task. The questionnaire is used to get more information about the subjects’ background and their opinions about the difficulties they encountered while reading the texts.

Transcription of the Think-Alouds The way in which behavior can be symbolized within a transcript varies from one study to the other. Ochs (1979) states that the orthographic representation of utterances vary according to goals of the research undertaken. For example, children’s utterances are commonly represented phonetically but when their pronunciation approaches adult norms, other representations may be used. In the current study, the researcher used the transcription system developed

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by Ochs (1979) which is based on Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson’s (1974) transcription practices of conversational analysis. According to Ochs, strictly standard orthography should be avoided and a modified one such as Sacks et al.’s should be employed. She adds that a modified orthography captures roughly the way in which a lexical item is pronounced versus the way in which it is written. For example, modified orthography includes such items as gonna, whazat, yah see?, lemme see it, and the like (Ochs 1979:61). This experiment only adapts Ochs’ transcription system of verbal material focusing on specific information that serves the purpose of the study. Nonverbal material was not marked. The following table will present each behavioral property to be represented in the transcript and the convention for representing each of the properties. All the utterances were written exactly in the same way as they were pronounced by the students. The transcription symbols for the verbal behavior used in this task are as follows:

Table 1 What to mark

How to mark

1. Utterance boundary 2. Pause length

placed at end of utterance (. .) marks a short pause (. . . .) marks a long pause ? marks high rise (as in questions) ! marks exclamatory utterance . marks a low fall ( ) unclear reading, no hearing achieved (laughter)

3. Intonation 4. Metatranscription marks 5. Other marks

General Observation of the Think-Alouds The data collected from the four presentations show that the Chinese and American subjects were able to reflect on the text that was culturally related. All subjects reported that they felt relaxed talking about the familiar topic during the think aloud task, while they encountered some difficulties when reading and talking about the unfamiliar topic. This was clearly evident in the amount of talk and the quality of ideas produced. When subjects read the familiar con-

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tent, they were able to remember and talk more about the customs, traditions and cultural aspects associated with the festival in as much detail as they could. However, there were situations where these students were hesitant and confused, either during the reporting task or the prediction activity. There were different signs of hesitation and confusion: long pauses, repetition of same ideas, use of language fillers, use of phrases such as “I don’t know,” etc. They used these strategies when they read unfamiliar content and even some segments of the familiar text. Data showed that the Chinese subjects were successfully able to reflect on the Chinese related text (Chinese New Year). Not only did they recall the main ideas but also they talked about the details and other aspects of the festival. The following excerpt from Zhi’s interview indicates how successful he was in recalling ideas presented in the first paragraph:

As we can see, his speech included all the ideas in the original text. Zhi and the other Chinese subject did this consistently when reading other segments of the text. To illustrate, let’s examine Zhi’s comments on the second paragraph of the Chinese New Year’s text:

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Again, Zhi was able to recall all the ideas presented in the second paragraph without any difficulties. In the interview, he added that he relied partly on his knowledge from his history class and personal experience as a member of Chinese society. Although Zhi and Yu Fan reported that they did not encounter any problems talking about this festival, their reports differed slightly especially when commenting on the last paragraph. Some details were missing, but the overall recall was not affected. It was also noticeable that the two subjects made some elaborations and distortions, some of which will be discussed below. Here are Yu Fan’s comments on the last paragraph of the Chinese New Year text:

As for the American related text, “Thanksgiving”, the Chinese subjects were able to recall most of the main ideas but they found difficulty reporting the details. On the contrary, the American sub-

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jects were able to reflect more on the culturally related text. Although they did not report some of the ideas (specifically in the first two paragraphs), they were able to talk about the major customs and traditions and provided successful elaborations as in the case of Mili. The following parts of Yu Fan, Milli and Emily’s interviews on the Thanksgiving text proves the point: Yu Fan’s Talk

Yu Fan’s responses were incomplete and sometimes inaccurate due to the failure to activitae the appropriate schemata. Unlike his reflection on the Chinese New Year’s text, the above excerpt of his talk included many pauses and vocabulary items that indicate a tendency towards generalization; a feature that is common among L2 readers when encountering a situation that causes hesitation and confusion. He was not able to draw the relationship between the settlers, colonists and the native Americans during this festive. He clearly expressed his confusion by posing the question “Is there a relationship? I do not know the reasons why the writer mentioned all of them here”. In addition, when he was asked if he remembered other

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ideas, he responded by questioning whether eating Turkey during Thanksgiving has a religious connotation or is considered a simbol of particular culture or subculture. Compared to the other paragraphs in the Thanksgiving text, the fourth paragraph was expected to stimulate students to talk and elaborate in depth on the customs and traditions. It provides clear content information and includes key elements for activating appropriate schema. The American subjects’ reflection on this paragraph was remarkably successful and rich both in quantity and quality. The following is an example of Mili and Emily’s responses to paragraph 4: Mili’s Talk

Emily’s Talk

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Mili was able to recall important idea units and further share her experience during the celebration, i.e. watching the Macy’s parade in New York, listening to tales about settlers, talking about the big dinner and foods items and drinks, remembering Native Americans and wearing traditional pilgrims’ attire. While Mili emphasized the role of modern activities, Emily focused on the traditional and historical aspects of the feast. She talked about the display of farm products, decoration of churches, Thanksgiving dishes (turkey and pumkin pies). She also compared the celebration with Sunday religious rituals during which family members gather for dinner and pray to God for his blessings. In addition, she mentioned that the first Thanksgiving celebration was held in New England in 1621 when Native Americans butchered deer to share food with the new settlers. These findings support the second hypothesis which predicts that American subjects will recall more of the American related text since they belong to the culture.

Main Idea Construction It seems that Yu Fan used the initial hypothesis strategy suggested by Johnson and Afflerbach (1985). The initial hypothesis is often used when subjects read familiar rather than unfamiliar texts. The authors claim that if the reader feels a reasonable accurate initial hypothesis of the main idea can be generated, based on the title, first sentences, or skim of the text, the reader does so, and then proceeds through the text, monitoring the accuracy of the hypothesis, and modifying it when appropriate.

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Yu Fan made an initial hypothesis about the main idea which was confirmed later after reading the entire paragraph. He was monitoring his reading and modifying this hypothesis until he came up with the main idea presented (the house cleaning in New Year) followed by other minor details. In fact, Yu Fan used the same strategy at an earlier stage, when he was exposed to the title of the passage. He was checking the information while reading in order to confirm his hypothesis. This checking process led him to construct the correct main ideas supported by the details and further elaborate and reflect on his own experience as a member of the Chinese culture. Let’s examine this part of his speech:

Unlike Fu Fan, Mili used the listing strategy. L2 readers use this strategy primarily because they are sometimes unable to distinguish between main and subordinate ideas and details. The discourse type is also a factor that determines the kind of strategy to be used. The discourse type which is used in this experiment is the least organized type of text that includes a collection of attributes. So, Mili realized that listing is an appropriate strategy for understanding such text since there are no sophisticated relations (high in hierarchy) among propositions. The following is a segment of Mili’s expectations of the fourth paragraph of the Thanksgiving Festival in which she used the listing strategy:

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Conclusion and Implications The results presented in this study support the hypothesis based upon the schema theory; the background knowledge about the content area of a text has a facilitating effect on comprehension and recall of expository material. Students read, understand, and remember texts that deal with their own familiar culture better, i.e. they are better able to comprehend materials for which they have well developed background knowledge than materials for which they lack the appropriate schemata. As was predicted in hypotheses one and three, Chinese students recalled more T units from the Chinese related text (Chinese New Year) than they did from the American related text (Thanksgiving). Yu Fan was able to recall 87% of the total number of T-units of the Chinese New Year text and 68% of the Thanksgiving text. Zhi’s scores were 89% on the Chinese related text and 70% on the thanksgiving text. Also, the American students recalled more of the American related text than the Chinese one. Mili had a score of 86% on the Thanksgiving text and 61% on the Chinese New Year Text while Emily scored 82% on the American related text and 59% on the Chinese New Year text. Although the four subjects did not recall as many T-units as they were expected to (assuming that the think out loud technique would be an aiding tool), the overall reading performance of Chinese and American students was affected by the familiarity of the topic being read. Several explanations may be offered. First, the reason both American and Chinese subjects did not recall some of T-units of the familiar text and many ideas of the unfamiliar text could be due to the effect of text type on recall. Meyer and Freedle (1984) identify five toplevel organizational patterns or rhetorical relationships: antecedentconsequence, problem-solution, adversative, description, and attribution. Meyer believes that the least organized text types such as the collection of descriptions type cause severe difficulty for second language learners who read, comprehend and recall such expository texts. The current

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study confirms Meyer’s claim since the collection of descriptions was the discourse type used in this experiment. In other words, the investigator believes that failure to recall some of the ideas was primarily due to the nature of the text structure rather than students’ comprehension ability. The problem was that at some point the subjects were not able to differentiate between main and subordinate ideas and specific details. It appears that the organization of the texts did not help students to decide on what is important information and what is peripheral. As a result, their verbal reports were sometimes shorter and included fewer ideas. Emily’s reflection on the first two paragraphs of the Thanksgiving texts is a good example:

Second, there may be other factors besides familiarity that account for the better recall of the Thanksgiving text by Chinese students (compared to the American subjects’ recall on the unfamiliar text). For instance, it may be the novelty effect (Carrell 1983). It would appear that for Chinese subjects, the unfamiliar text (Thanksgiving

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festival) was memorable, possibly because of its novel character. It is possible that the Chinese students did not risk activating their prior knowledge for fear that it may be inappropriate; instead, they made sure that any idea they were inclined to recall was indeed from the text and not from prior knowledge. Last, the difference in performance between the Chinese and American subjects may be explained in the light of their educational background and the nature of their AFL courses. The basic point is that the Chinese educational system encourages rote learning, and as a result students use rote learning processes when they encounter reading material. So, being trained to memorize resulted in better recall on the unfamiliar “Thanksgiving” text compared to the American subject’s performance on the Chinese New Year text. So, the ability to memorize the text by rote was perhaps an advantage that Chinese students had over American students. Although much emphasis has been placed on oral communicative skills in the American educational system, American students are trained to interact with texts, which, in turn requires training in other comprehension skills and critical thinking. So, one can possibly confirm that American students’ language skills can ensure better performance and higher scores on recalling the two texts. Based on this, it was also expected that American subjects’ performance on the prediction task will be better than that of the Chinese subjects. But this was not the case reported here. The two American students scored less on the Chinese related text compared with the Chinese students’ performance on the Thanksgiving text. The Chinese students also performed better on the prediction task. One possible answer may be drawn from Carrell’s (1983) explanation of how native and nonnative speakers approach texts. She suggests that while native speakers appear to have a good sense of how easy or difficult a text is for them to understand, ESL/EFL readers appear not to have this sense. They probably perceive a text as easy, but may not recall it well—a point that needs further investigation. Another justification could be that the overemphasis on oral communication and production of authentic language may have an effect on their ability to infer and recall expository material. Further practice on reading strategies and recall may improve their performance.

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Main Idea Construction and Prediction The four case studies presented in this study indicate that the four participants used different strategies; mainly initial hypothesis strategy, listing strategy and automatic construction. All subjects constructed the main idea of the first paragraph automatically. This T-unit served as a main idea for the first paragraph and reflects the theme of the whole passage. The conclusion that can be drawn from this discussion is that the four subjects used different cognitive strategies to construct the main idea as well as automatic construction. It appears that prior knowledge and the think aloud technique played a significant role in facilitating main-idea construction. The selection of strategy depended mainly on the subjects’ ability to activate the appropriate schemata as well as their overall language competency. Four inferences can be made. One is that it was not easy to predict incoming information from a poorly structured text. Second, the skill to make predictions needs a lot of training. In some cases, it was unclear whether the American subjects’ inability to predict incoming content was due to the activation of the wrong schemata or the lack of appropriate training in prediction. Third, it is possible that the influence of text structure on the ability to make correct prediction was stronger than the activation of the appropriate schemata. The American subjects might have activated the appropriate schemata but were unable to employ them as a direct result of the influence of text structure. Moreover, Chinese subjects’ success in making more accurate predictions should not be understood as the effect of solely activating the appropriate schemata. The social context of literacy use in students’ first language is another factor that might have a strong effect on prediction.

Reading Strategies In the light of the results obtained from this study, the researcher suggests some strategies that he believes may facilitate students’ reading comprehension of this type of expository texts. These are brainstorming activities, Expository Passage Organizer, anticipation guides and reconstruction of text. They facilitate learning by focusing on what the reader actually knows and the interaction between both students and the teacher. During these activities, the students’ role

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is one of considering what they already know about the topic and generating some expectations about what they will learn. The teacher’s role is guiding students’ realization of what they know and their use of previously accumulated experiences to facilitate new learning. It is the give-and-take that occurs in the process of these activities that leads to increased learning. Brainstorming Brainstorming is one of the activities used to arouse curiosity before reading. It is an activity that draws upon students’ own knowledge of a topic then invites them to work to organize that information. Two basic steps are recognized when using the brainstorming technique, one is identifying a broad concept that reflects the main topic to be studied in the assigned reading; the other is to have students work in small groups to generate a list of words related to the concept in a fixed time. These steps help the instructor instantly discover what background knowledge students possess about the topic they are going to study. The technique starts when the teachers provides a word or phrase then asks students for all the words that come to mind when they think about the key concept. When the brainstorming activity is over, the teacher can ask small groups to categorize the words and provide titles for the categories. Students must be prepared to identify the categories (and/or subcategories) and the logic behind each arrangement. In order to stimulate curiosity and arouse interest in the topic to be read, the instructor can ask students to make predictions about the content to be studied. One way of doing this is to ask, “Given the list of words and categories you’ve developed, what do you think the reading assignment will be about?” This activity will help teachers get a quick and easy indicator of the knowledge and experience students bring to the lesson. After discussing the word categories and sharing the information, students read (for further discussion see Herber 1978). The following is an example of brainstorming activity on the topic of Festivals which can be developed to include many elements of the target passage(s).

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Figure 1

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Anticipation Guides Anticipation guides are believed to activate prior knowledge and promote purposeful reading (Vacca & Vacca 1993). One of the major features of an anticipation guide is that it brings to the surface misconceptions about a topic. Then these misconceptions can be modified through a well-formulated instructional sequence. Anticipation guides operate at the experientially-based level of understanding and therefore they elicit a response based on one’s current belief system. Students at the pre-reading stage may strongly defend a response to a guide statement with little fear of failure. Later, as the learning sequence progresses into the reading and post-reading stages, a mismatch between the students’ preconceptions about a topic and the information being introduced should result in a subsequent modification of their initial knowledge base. Below is an anticipation guide demonstration on Thanksgiving in the United Sates of America. I believe this guide will establish a purpose for reading and help students realize what they know about cultural customs and traditions associated with Thanksgiving. Prior to reading, students have an opportunity to express their opinions and justify their choices, which will be modified, changed or corrected in the post reading stage. Such a guide prepares students to focus on unfamiliar cultural notions and accordingly avoid difficulties which they may encounter.

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Directions: Read each statement about Thanksgiving. In the “Before” column, check the ones you agree with. Be ready to explain your reasoning.

Directions: Now that you’ve read about Thanksgiving, read the statements again. This time check the statements you agree with in the “After” column. Then in the “Line/Paragraph” column, write down the line or paragraph in the text that helped you decide. Again, be ready to explain your reasoning. Figure 2. Anticipation guide demonstration: Thanksgiving

Expository Passage Organizer (EPO) EPO study guides (Miller and George 1992) are process models teachers use to improve students’ reading and writing of expository text. One of the advantages of EPO’s is that they help students see

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the structure of expository text and how the structure and organization of ideas in the text affect their comprehension and recall. In addition, they help students use reading as a model for their writing by focusing their attention on overall text structure and organization of main ideas and details. Students in this case are able to develop their text schemata or cognitive text templates which are essential for producing good reading comprehension and writing. The ability to develop text schemata is gained through students’ experience in completing ESO study guides for various types of text structures in well-written prose. Instructions: Passage pattern:

A. Complete the following EPO by looking back at the passage. B. Correct your EPO by using the completed EPO on the last page of this study guide. Collection of descriptions

Title:

Figure 3. Sample Expository Passage Organizer (EPO) for a descriptive text

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The EPO guide below is designed to teach the texts used in this study and similar texts. Although the texts follow the descriptive pattern, EPO guides can be used in teaching other expository patterns such as cause-effect and comparison-contrast. In fact, EPO is a very useful strategy in teaching text structure.

Reconstructing Text Texts written in a listing format are considered poorly structured and believed to cause problems for students, particularly if recall is a major objective of the reading lesson. It is also true that most textbook organization is of this sort (simple listing). Customarily, the author makes a general statement, and then supports it with a number of statements listed in no particular order. This pattern does not help the reader discern the more significant ideas. In addition, it does not stress the relationships among key ideas. The problems encountered by using the simple listing pattern in reading can be solved if the teacher restructures the text to become more organized and hence, better recalled (i.e. cause-effect, comparisoncontrast). Alvermann (1982) reported that using the restructuring strategy results in better comprehension of major points than would be gained by merely following the author’s listing. In this activity, the teacher identifies a key term for the material to be read and then draws a form that corresponds to the pattern selected. This form has empty boxes arranged to represent the slots into which information can be mentally inserted by readers as they process the material in their search for missing information. It is important that the students be trained to use the reconstructing technique and be given the opportunity to construct their own forms and organizers. At this stage, modeling plays an important role. Students need to be shown several examples before they can actually start using the technique on their own. Here is an example of a comparison and contrast pattern on the topic of New Year:

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Directions: See if you can restructure the following passage on the topic of New Year, which is written in a listing pattern, by processing the passage as comparison and contrast pattern. The key term in the passage is ways of celebrating New Year. A response form that includes the key term and empty boxes that represent slots for the contrasting ideas has been provided below. Read the passage, mentally filling in the empty slots. Key term: Ways of celebrating New Year. Pattern: Comparison and contrast.

Figure 4. New Year Text

Limitation of the Study Suggestions for Further Research This study focused on the collection of description expository text type using the think aloud technique. In order to understand the influence of background knowledge on L2 readers, other text types should be examined. Despite the positive results obtained from the use of the think aloud method in this experiment, the effectiveness of the technique should be tested against other research tools to confirm this hypothesis. In addition, the study of the simultaneous effect of content and form needs further research. As suggested by Carrell (1984), further research on the combined effects of content and form in ESL reading comprehension is needed Further research may also attempt to examine other types of proficiency levels, other cultural groups and other types of manipulation of content and form. In this study, the researcher examined the performance of four university students from different cultures.

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It seems practical to suggest that further research studies should include groups from different ethnic, geographical, professional and cultural backgrounds. The study of the influence of prior knowledge on reading comprehension should also deal with other aspects of background knowledge. Background knowledge has been operationalized in a variety of ways: cultural knowledge; religious knowledge; vocabulary knowledge; technical knowledge; topic familiarity and contextual visuals. Researchers should extend their work to include these elements.

the case of the think aloud technique Appendix

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the case of the think aloud technique Slicing Chinese New Year text into T-Units:

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Slicing Thanksgiving text into T-Units

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF THE SEGMENTS OF FRENCH AND ARABIC Daniel L. Newman

I. Introduction A comparison of the Arabic phonemic inventory against those of a representative sample of the world’s languages (317 in total) included in the UCLA Phonological Segment Inventory Database—commonly known as UPSID—and reported by Maddieson (1984) reveals that Arabic deviates considerably from what is common within UPSID in a number of respects (Newman 2002). The areas of divergence include the number of consonants, consonant-vowel ratio, and, especially, the high number (10) of consonant segments that are unique to Arabic, most notable of which are the pharyngealized sounds. If we add the sounds shared by languages that derived them from Arabic, the total goes up to some 15 sounds, with Arabic thus contributing 4.1.% of the 359 unique sounds in the UPSID database (second only to the Khoisan language ?Xª) with its 70 unique segments). In this paper, we shall use acoustic techniques to examine how Arabic compares with French and the specific problems encountered by French-speakers learning Arabic. At the same time, it is clear that many of the issues that are discussed here will also be of use in the teaching of French to Arabic speakers.

II. Data Corpus and Methodology The acoustic analyses presented in the course of this paper are based on several corpora. The main Arabic connected speech corpus consisted of audio-tape recordings of the entire Qur an read by shaykh Muhammad Sadiq al-Minshawi (20 tapes, published by Abu Hamza Recordings, Cairo, [1994]). The audiorecordings were digitized at a sampling frequency of 22,050Hz; and downsampled to 16bit, 11kHz.

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In the corpus, the sounds of approximately 30 minutes of recitation were segmented manually on the basis of visual information in a broadband spectrogram and auditory assessment. These were analysed acoustically by means of PRAAT (Boersma & Weenink) with standard analysis parameters suitable for a male voice (Newman & Verhoeven 2002). The second corpus of Arabic connected speech consisted of a reading of the Arabic translation of the ‘North Wind and the Sun’ passage as it appeared in the Principles of the IPA (1972). This passage was read by a male native speaker of the Egyptian variety of Arabic (Cairo) and recorded in high-quality conditions (cf. Newman & Verhoeven 2002). The vowels in this passage were subsequently segmented and analysed acoustically in the same conditions as the Qur an recitation vowels. The third and final Arabic corpus consisted of a reading by a (male) Cairene speaker of a list of 100 words in isolation. For French, the corpus consisted of 150 words in isolation read by two male French speakers (northern French). The values presented in graphs are the average values.

III. Consonants 1. Inventory Classical Arabic (CA) contains 29 phonetically distinct consonant segments,1 whose manners and places of articulation may be represented as follows. [TABLE 1] The number of consonants is well above the mean of 22.8 within the language sample of UPSID. If we add the 26 geminates (i.e. lengthened variants), which have a separate entry within UPSID (though not in the traditional IPA framework), the total number of consonant segments increases to 56 (2.5 times the mean). [TABLE 2]

1 This number excludes the pharyngealized lateral /l/, which in Classical Arabic only occurs in its long reflex in /ɑllɑh/. The sound, whose phonological status has been somewhat controversial, is, however, common in the Arabic dialects; cf. Ferguson 1956; Kärstner 1981: 78–9; Mitchell 1990: I, 48–50; Petracek 1952; Cantineau 1946: 113; Lehn 1963.

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d

q

Glottal

k

Pharyngeal

Uvular

Palatal

Post-alveolar

Dento-alveolar

Dental

t

Velar

Plosive b Nasal m Trill Tap Fricative Affricate Approximant Lateral approx.

Labio-dental

Bilabial

Table 1. Traditional Arabic consonant inventory2

ʔ

n r ɾ

f

θ

ð

s z

ʃ

χ ʁ  ʕ

h

d j

w

l

Pharyngealized consonants: t d s ð

As said before, Arabic boasts no fewer than 15 (or 10 depending on the standpoint) unique sounds—most famously of course the pharyngealized (or ‘velarized’) sounds (‘emphatics’). However, since this paper deals with specific problems encountered by French speakers, the ‘emphatics’ have been omitted from the analysis as their unique status results in acquisition problems for all non-Arabic speakers. Suffice it to say that on the whole French speakers find it just as difficult as other non-Arabic speakers to acquire them, whereas they do not generally pose any problems in the pronunciation of French for Arabic speakers.

2 In line with IPA practice, when sounds appear in pairs in tables 1, 2 and 3, the symbol on the right denotes a voiced sound, the one on the left a voiceless one. In the case of sounds appearing by themselves in a given place of articulation, the left-hand side of the box is reserved for voiceless sounds, the right-hand side for voiced ones.

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Plosive Nasal

b

t

d

b

t d

m

n

m

n

r

Tap

ɾ

f

θ

f

θ ð

ð

Glottal

Pharyngeal

Uvular

Labial-velar

Velar

Palatal

.

Trill Fricative

Post-alveolar

Dento-alveolar

Dental

Labio-dental

Bilabial

Table 2. Full Arabic consonant inventory

k

q

ʔ

k

q

ʔ

s z

ʃ

χ ʁ

s z

ʃ

χ ʁ  ʕ h

Affricate

 ʕ

h

d d 

Approximant Lateral approx.

j

w

j

w

l l

Pharyngealized consonants: t d s ð t d s ð

The French inventory falls well within the average range with 20 consonant segments.3 [TABLE 3] In terms of place of articulation, it is interesting to note that in the labial-uvular range, both languages have a total of 19 segments, though Arabic has on average one more series for the manners of

3 This number excludes /ŋ/, which occurs only in foreign (English) borrowings. In contemporary standard French it is even threatened with extinction altogether as there is an increasing trend towards dropping it in favour of the dental nasal: e.g. /paʁkin/ (instead of /paʁkiŋ/).

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Fricative

t

m f

v

s

z

Uvular

Velar

Palatal k

n

Approximant Lateral approx.

Post-alveolar

d

Labial-veal

Nasal

p b

Labial-palatal

Plosive

Dental

Bilabial

Labio-dental

Table 3. French consonant inventory

ɥ

v

g

 ʃ

ʁ

j l

articulation it has in common with French. Both languages share a predilection for the dental area (as opposed to the alveolar focus in English, for example). Arabic is one of only thirty-five languages within UPSID (11%) to have stop phonemes in five different places of articulation (the most common number being three, found in 53.9% of the sample), whereas there are only 23 other languages in UPSID that have /k/ but lack /p/! As for the manners of articulation, the number of Arabic fricative series (seven in total) is equally unusual (shared by a small minority of languages—6% in UPSID). Besides the pharyngealized consonants, French speakers thus have to acquire eleven segments, most of which in the uvular, pharyngeal and glottal areas. Arabic speakers, on the other hand, are faced with seven new sounds, all of which are anterior of the palatal region. 2. Distribution As for the consonant distribution [cf. TABLE 4], it is interesting to note that the thirteen consonants shared by both languages occur in the same positions, except for /w/, which does not occur in wordfinal positions in French (and only rarely in word-medial contexts).

minwal

man nafr φ jawm

wad ib

lisan

rakaba

arim d im

huwa

φ

batɑl midrɑb mustabsir ɑðɑra

sajf

χurda ʁurfa ʕinab

tɑʔira dɑwʔ sɑri ðulm

saʕj naw

raχis luʁa tɑʕun rahib ziam masd id sariʕ kaslan amas sinada

ʃakir

φ

sɑruχ baliʁ iqlaʕ nabi talmi dard ɑd ar d abal samum ranin

muʃakis

zajn

ʃɑrt ɑdid raχis malfuð

dirs ibtizaz taʃwiʃ

musdal bizr

sijn

φ

tadiθ laðið lafif

raθajat qɑðafa infid ar

sikak

θumma ðaχara firar

t d s ð

bab

ʕabd χatama izdijad maskun but ʃurud

bariʔ

jaʔs

Arabic Consonant Distribution Medial Final

ʔan φ bajt tarjama darb kam φ

Initial

/ʔ/ /p/ /b/ /t/ /d/ /k/ // /θ/ /ð/ /f/ /v/ /s/ /z/ /ʃ/ / / /χ/ /ʁ/ /ʕ/ /h/ // /d / /r/ /l/ /m/ /n/ // /j/ /w/ /ɥ/

Sound

Table 4. French and Arabic Consonant Distribution

φ pas besogne tasse directe quitter garant φ φ foire valoir soir zone choix joint φ rouge φ φ φ φ φ loin mais noir hier oui huître φ φ φ φ

Initial

aller amarrer renier agneau souiller soin suicide

arrière

sapphire avaler assis poison mâchoire bouger

report bâbord marteau déduire acquit aigu

mâle âme donne peigne deuil – –

marre

neuf mauve messe douze hanche belge

pompe bombe boîte bolide cinq gangue

French Consonant Distribution Medial Final

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In terms of frequency of occurrence, we can draw up the following ranking order:4 French 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

/ʁ/ /l/ /t/ /s/ /p/ /d/ /k/ /m/ /n/ /v/

: : : : : : : : : :

15.00% 10.62% 9.67% 8.76% 7.96% 7.23% 6.35% 5.98% 5.22% 4.45%

11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20.

Arabic /j/ / / /f/ /z/ /w/ /b/ /g/ /ʃ/ /ɥ/ //

: : : : : : : : : :

3.21% 2.88% 2.55% 2.34% 2.30% 2.26% 1.13% 0.99% 0.84% 0.26%

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.

/l/ /m/ /n/ /r/ /t/ /b/ /ʕ/ /d/ /f/ /s/ /h/ /ʔ/ /q/

: : : : : : : : : : : : :

11.77% 6.18% 5.14% 4.66% 4.49% 3.35% 3.34% 3.11% 2.56% 2.53% 2.50% 2.06% 2.13%

14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26.

/k/ // /d / /s/ /t/ /ʃ/ /χ/ /ð/ /d/ /z/ /θ/ /ʁ/ /ð/

: : : : : : : : : : : : :

1.85% 1.79% 1.35% 0.96% 0.95% 0.91% 0.80% 0.67% 0.65% 0.64% 0.53% 0.36% 0.20%

A close examination reveals that there are in fact very few significant discrepancies in the most-frequently used consonant sounds. Indeed, despite the reputation of Arabic as a ‘back’ language, nine of the ten most-frequently occurring consonants are situated in the dentialveolar and labial regions, with the pharyngeal /ʕ/ being the odd one out. Interestingly enough, it is the backmost consonant in French (and the only phoneme in the post-velar region), i.e. the uvular /ʁ/, which heads the list, whereas it is, in fact, relatively rare in Arabic!5 This information is, of course, of great significance to the order in which Arabic sounds should be taught to French speakers (or indeed those of other languages!), and vice versa. For instance, it does not make sense, pedagogically, to start the conditioning to the Arabic sound inventory with the ‘emphatics’, which approach contrasts with

4 The ranking order for French is that of Delattre 1965, while the Arabic list is based on data extracted from a corpus of 139m words (cf. http://www.itsnet.com/ -qamus/references/arabic_letters.htm). Unfortunately, the Arabic corpus did not allow the accurate establishment of values for the semi-vowels /j/ and /w/. 5 By way of comparison, one may point to the fact that the ranking order of English consonants does not differ widely either in terms of the ‘top-ten’ sounds, with six sounds common to all three languages: 1. /n/; 2. /t/; 3. /d/; 4; /s/; 5. /l/; 6. /ð/; 7. /r/; 8. /m/; 9. /k/; 10. /w/; 11. /z/; 12. /v/; 13. /b/; 14. /f/; 15. /p/; 16. /h/; 17. /ŋ/; 18. /g/; 19. /ʃ/; 20. /j/; 21. /d /; 22. /tʃ/; 23. /θ/; 24. / / (data based on Gimson & Ramsaran 1989: 219).

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the prevailing practice of concentrating on phonetic differences between the learner’s language and the target language as early as possible. Plosives Arabic has two more places of articulation for plosive phonemes than French, viz. uvular and glottal. However, these do not tend to pose any problems to French-speaking learners, whose uvular ‘experience’ with /ʁ/ comes in handy for the acquisition of /q/, whereas the glottal stop /ʔ/ is not uncommon in French, even though it does not have phonemic status. It commonly appears before word-initial vowels in certain contexts, and for certain paralinguistic effects (cf. Malécot 1980: 27ff.). When it comes to the ‘new’ French plosives that have to be acquired by Arabic speakers, the velar // does not cause any difficulties, if only because it is a sound that most Arabic speakers are familiar with since this realization of the CA palato-alveolar affricate is a shibboleth for Colloquial Egyptian,6 which has become familiar throughout the Arab world because of the country’s prolific film and music industries. Conversely, the voiceless bilabial plosive /p/ reveals itself to be far more problematic, as it is for Arabic speakers learning English, with parking being pronounced like barking. Any contrastive analysis of plosives must also address the issue of voice onset time (VOT), i.e. the time lag between the release of a stop and the start of glottal pulsing (voice). VOT has come to be considered a core acoustic indicator for the production and perception of homorganic stops in many languages, with a number of studies focusing on Arabic (Yeni-Komshian et al. 1977; Flege & Port 1981; Jesry 1996; Radwan 1996; Khattab 2000). Usually measured in microseconds (ms), VOT is generally said to come in one of three types: zero VOT (vibration onset more or less simultaneous with plosive release); positive VOT (delay in onset after release); negative VOT (vocal fold vibration preceding plosive release). As from a VOT of 50ms, the airflow results in a friction noise, known as aspiration (cf. English /p, t, k/ in stressed positions, especially word-initially). Both French and Arabic are traditionally said to be ‘short-lag’ languages (as opposed to ‘long-lag’ languages like English). However, our research 6 This applies to Lower Egypt (Cairo and the Nile Delta) only as Upper Egyptian (Sa idi) dialects have the more usual fricative (/ /) or affricate (/d /) reflex, as well as /d/ and /y/; cf. Nishio 1994; Woidich 1978; Khalafallah 1969; Behnstedt & Woidich 1985: I, 70, II, 10–14; Fischer & Jastrow 1980: 51.

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(30 tokens for each language, involving the plosives shared by both languages in word-initial positions) reveals a number of discrepancies. The average VOT for Arabic /t/ and /k/ is 28ms and 38ms, respectively, which figures are below those given by Pflege and Port (1981) for Saudi speakers and those reported by al-Ani (1970), but in line with the findings of Yeni-Komshian et al. (1977) for Lebanese Arabic. It is clear that a great deal further cross-dialectal investigation is required in this field for Arabic. The French meanVOT values measured were 35ms for /t/ and 45ms for /k/, which do not deviate dramatically from those of other studies (e.g. Fischer-Jørgensen 1972; Nearey & Rochet 1994). It is little suprising therefore that from a practical teaching point of view, VOT does not interfere with the pronunciation of French speakers (unlike that of those of strongly VOT-positive languages like English or German). In the area of the voiced stops, both French and Arabic have zero VOT (or lead voicing), with continuous voicing throughout the production of the stop, i.e. there is ‘vocal-fold vibration throughout the closure period, through the release and into the vowel’ (Temple 2000: 193). Indeed, French, like Arabic, ‘follows a binary system of presence or absence of glottal pulsing during the closure period of the stop’ (Khattab 2000: 96). Still on the subject of voicing, some French speakers have a tendency either to devoice word-final voiced consonants, with being realized as /ʃadit/ or to realize those sounds with a vocalic off-glide: e.g. /rikabə/ (for /rikab). At the same time, it must be stated that the latter phenomenon affects all final consonants in some varieties, most notably Parisian, where the off-glide is often lengthened.

3. Fricatives and Affricates The pronunciation of the Arabic fricatives is less straightforward for French speakers than that of the plosives. For one thing, there are four segments that are absent from French. Interestingly enough, two of the missing phonemes are in the anterior region, i.e. the dental fricative set /θ/ and /ð/, which also cause French speakers great difficulty in English. Naturally, this is not a problem in the colloquial varieties of Arabic where these sounds are consistently replaced

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by /t/–/s/ and /d/–/z/, respectively. Indeed, it is well known that the colloquial influence on Arabic speakers learning English results in breathe sounding like breeze and think like sink (as they do for many French learners!). Equally problematic—albeit for different reasons—is the case of the glottal fricative /h/. Though in spelling French has the letter , this is always mute, even when mention is made, misleadingly, of ‘h aspiré’, which simply means that the vowel of the preceding article is not deleted: e.g. le héros /lə eʁo/, les héros /le eʁo/ vs. l’herbe /lεʁbə/, les herbes /lezεʁbə/. French speakers encounter problems not so much in acquiring the sound /h/ as in pronouncing it in word-initial, -medial and -final positions. Interestingly enough, there does not seem to be the kind of hypercorrection that often affects the speech of French speakers learning English, involving the addition of /h/ to word-initial vowels, with ‘air’ sounding like ‘hair’. This phenomenon occurs in combination with the dropping of /h/ when it actually should be pronounced, as in ‘heating’ being pronounced like ‘eating’. It stands to reason that this issue also intervenes for the Arabic voiceless pharyngeal fricative //, the pronunciation of which poses considerable difficulty for French speakers, who often replace it by its glottal counterpart. In terms of perception, one may add that in word-final positions, many French speakers fail fully to appreciate the difference between the glottal and pharyngeal sounds. In the pharyngeal area, the voiced fricative /ʕ/ also marks a black spot, though not just for French speakers as this sound is reported in only eight of the world’s languages, whereas the lengthened /ʕ/ is unique to Arabic. One should hasten to add, however, that this sound is subject to some controversy. Although most researchers (Eslin 1996; Laufer 1981; Mitchell 1990–3; Gairdner 1925; Delattre 1971) agree that this is a fricative, others (al-Ani 1970; Kästner 1981) identify it as a voiceless stop, or pharyngealized glottal stop (Thelwall & Sa adeddin 1990), whereas physiological investigation suggested that it is an approximant (Laufer 1996) or voiced ‘frequentative’ trill (Ghali 1983). Our own acoustic research would seem to suggest that in the High Classical style of Qur an recitation, the sound is realized as a fricative. It is clear that a great deal more research (both cross- and intradialectal) is required to determine the exact status of this seemingly unstable segment. As for the uvular fricative /ʁ/, Delattre’s study (1971) of the pharyngeal features of this sound in French and Arabic revealed the

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high degree of similarity in production in that both are produced with a stricture in the upper pharynx, with the uvular trills being a secondary phenomenon, albeit a decisive one in the perception of /ʁ/.7 As a result, the voiceless counterpart of this sound, /χ/, is not difficult to acquire by French speakers, though they do have a tendency to fronting, resulting in the velar /x/. Although the French and Arabic fricatives /s/ and /z/ are realized as dental, the articulatory process underlying the French sounds differs somewhat from that used in their Arabic counterparts in that the former involve a lowering of the tongue tip (which thus faces the lower teeth). The intensity ranges, however, are similar in both languages, with concentrations (on average) as from 5000Hz and 3500Hz for French /s/ and /ʃ/, respectively, and 4000Hz and 3000Hz in Arabic for the same sounds. As for the classical Arabic voiced palato-alveolar affricate /d /, this is consistently replaced by the homorganic fricative by French speakers. However, once again, this does not impair communication since this sound is the common reflex in MSA as well as in a large number of dialects. (cf. Mitchell 1990–3: I, 51, II, 18–20; Kaye 1972; Gairdner 1925: 23–4; Kästner 1981: 64–5; al-Ani 1970: 32; Fischer & Jastrow 1980: 51). 4. Trills and Taps Besides the uvular fricative [ʁ], Arabic also has two denti-alveolar ‘r’ sounds, i.e. the trill [r] and the flapped [ɾ].8 It is worth adding, however, that the former is usually realized as [r], which sound only occurs in three languages in the UPSID sample (Arabic, Shilha, Somali). Both ‘r’ sounds may be subject ton a great deal of interference in that French speakers sometimes replace them by the uvular fricative (or trill).

7 In some varieties of French, notably in Belgium, this sound is, in fact, realized as a uvular trill [r]. 8 The status of this latter sound is subject to debate, as some researchers report a short trill ([r]) instead, e.g. al-Ani 1970; but also see Mitchell 1990–3: I, 46ff.; al-Qahtani 2000: 6ff.

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5. Approximants The approximants common to both languages are produced in almost identical fashion, and do not, therefore, pose any problems. The fact that standard French has a bilabial-palatal semi-vowel (/ɥ/) alongside a bilabial-velar one (/w/) does not cause any interference since it is the latter which is usually ‘exported’. Furthermore, the palatal variant is lacking in a number of varieties of French. The geminated counterparts, i.e. /j/ and /w/, which are reported in only few languages besides Arabic, do prove to be a problem at times for French speakers. As for the lateral approximant /l/, this is a dental ‘clear’ /l/ (i.e. one in which the front of the tongue is raised towards the palate when the tongue tip touches the upper teeth, resulting in an [i] resonance) in both French and Arabic. French speakers do have some trouble with the so-called ‘dark’ allophone of this sound, which involves a hollowing of the front of the tongue, with a secondary stricture caused by the raising of the dorsum towards the velum. This velarized alveolar /l/ ([]) occurs in a number of contexts in Arabic, most notably adjacent to ‘emphatics’ as a result of assimilation. 6. Duration Consonant gemination is another crucial feature in contrastive ArabicFrench phonetics. This aspect of Arabic phonetics does not generally get the attention it deserves, despite the fact that it is an area in which Arabic distinguishes itself from many other languages. (q.v. Bonnot 1979). While the duration of Arabic consonants is distinctive, in French length is only distinctive in /ʁ/, and then only in intervocalic positions (see Delattre 1965). As a result, gemination often causes problems to French speakers both in perception and production. It is also worth noting that the above-mentioned problem of producing word-final voiced consonants with a vocalic off-glide is particularly salient in word-final geminates: e.g. /dubbə/ (for /dubb/).

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IV. Vowels 1. Descriptions and Distribution Though Classical Arabic has six vowel segments, the number of distinctive vowel qualities—3—is well below the UPSID mean (8.7). These are traditionally represented in the famous Arabic vowel ‘triangle’, representing the ‘fundamental’ vowels, as they were called by Gairdner (1925). [DIAGRAM 1] Diagram 1. Classical Arabic vowel triangle /i/

/u/

/a/

To these should be added the lengthened vowel phonemes, which yields the following picture [TABLE 5]: Table 5: The vowels of Classical Arabic Front Close Open

Central

i/ii

Back u/uu

a/aa

It is worth pointing out, however, that most Arabic dialects come closer with an average of 5/6, as the following table of the Cairene vowel system shows [TABLE 6].9 Table 6: The vowels of Egyptian Arabic Front Close Mid Open 9

Central

i/ii

Back u/uu

e

a/aa

o ɑ/ɑɑ

Cf. Gairdner 1925; Birkeland 1952: 45ff.; Harrell 1957; Ferguson 1957: 45–68;

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Unsurprisingly, the three Arabic vowel qualities are also the three most common in the world’s languages, with /i, u, a/ being found in, respectively, 91%, 83.9% and 88% of languages in the UPSID data base. The vowel-consonant ratio (the number of vowels divided by the number of consonants) is also quite uncommon, and goes against the prevailing orthodoxy that most languages reveal an ‘association between overall inventory size and consonant/vowel balance’ (Maddieson 1984: 9). For Arabic, this number (again entering the different vowel qualities into the equation) is 0.1, as opposed to the UPSID median ratio of 0.36. Though this is unusual within the UPSID database, it is, however, entirely consistent with the situation in other Semitic tongues. Conversely, French is unusual for the opposite reason since its C/V ratio (0.76) is more than double the median. The vowel values presented in this paper are based on a total number of 600 observations culled from all corpora, approximately equally distributed along the different vowel categories. The formant values are averages. These are also compared against those found in previously published studies, notably those by Al-Ani (1970), Ghazeli (1979), Belkaid (1984), and Abou Haidar (1994). Any interpretation must, however, take into account the differences in approach, corpus and methodology and processing between those studies.10 The vowels represented in the graphs are the three ‘basic’ vowels with their long and short allophones, as well as the main allophones of the open central vowel /a/, i.e. /ɑ, ɑ/, which occur next to the pharyngealized and uvular consonants. The first observation that emerges from [DIAGRAM 2] is the centralization and lowering of the Arabic close vowels, even in the high classical style of Qur anic recitation, sometimes resulting in positions associated with, respectively, [ɵ] and [ɵ]. Indeed in the case of the back vowel, the values for Cairene are closer to the expected norm than those of classical orthoepy, while its close front vowel is the most central of all, though combined with a low F1 value (see Table 9)! The short allophones of the close vowels are lower and slightly more central, whereas those of the open vowels tend to be slightly more close (and fronted).

Lehn & Slager 1959: 32–33; Harrell 1960: 20ff.; Cowan 1970; Drozik 1974; Anani 1980; Norlin 1987; T. Mitchell 1990–3. 10 For a detailed discussion, see Newman & Verhoeven 2002.

contrastive analysis of the segments of french & arabic

199

Diagram 2. Arabic vowels: comparative acoustic results11 –200

u

)i(

–300

Al-Ani Ghazeli

–400

Haydar F1

–500 Belkaid –600

Cairene

–700

Qur’an recitation

–800

a

a

–2500

–2000

–1500

–1000

–500

F2

It is also clear from the diagram that the open vowels are considerably more stable than the open ones, whereas one should remark on the proximity of /a/ and /ɑ/, with the former being very often in the [ɐ] region. The ‘condensed’ picture represented in [DIAGRAM 3] confirms the relative stability of the open vowels, and reveals that the qualities of the close vowels in the recitation sample are closer to [i] and [υ] than to [i] and [u].

11 It is worth noting that not every researcher has values for all vowels; al-Ani and Ghazeli both lack /ɑ, ɑ/, while the latter author does not include /a, a/ either.

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200

Diagram 3. Arabic vowels in isolation vs recitation values

–300

)i(

u

a

a

–400

–500 F1

–600

–700

–800 –2500

–2000

–1500

–1000

–500

F2

In the French vowel system we can observe 16 phonemes—12 oral segments and 4 nasal ones—, which may be broadly divided into eight classes (cf. [DIAGRAM 4], [TABLE 7], [TABLE 8]): – – – – – – – –

3 3 1 1 3 1 3 1

oral front rounded vowels (/y, ø, œ/); oral front unrounded vowels (/i, e, e/); nasal front rounded vowel (/¤œ/); nasal front unrounded vowel (/‘e/); oral unrounded central vowels (/ə, a, ɑ/); nasal unrounded central vowel (/‘ɑ/); oral back rounded vowels (/u, o, ɔ/); nasal back rounded vowel (/‘ɔ/).

contrastive analysis of the segments of french & arabic

201

Diagram 4. Traditional picture of the French vowel system m

i, y

e, ø e‘Ç

o

e, œ

˜

œ˜ a/a˜ ɑ

Table 7. The oral vowels of French Front Close Mid-close Mid Mid-open Open

Central

i, y e, ø

Back u o

ə

e, œ

ɔ

a, ɑ

Table 8. The nasal vowels of French Front Mid-close Mid-open Open

Central

‘e

¤œ

‘ɑ

Back ɔ‘

With its 16 vowels (12 oral and 4 nasal), French is part of a small group of languages (3.2% of UPSID), whereas its 12 vowel qualities are shared by only 5 languages in the sample (1.6%). The high number of vowel qualities may be considered an Indo-European feature, since of the 11 languages with more than 10 vowel qualities, 5 are Indo-European. The second point involves nasalization. The presence of nasal vowels seems also to be linked with the number of vowel qualities, as

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21% of languages with 4–6 vowel qualities have contrastive nasalization, which percentage goes up to 53.8% for languages with 10 or more vowel qualities. The mid-open front nasalized /¤œ/ is only attested for French in the UPSID database, whereas the mid-open back and front nasalized vowels (‘e, ‘ɔ/) are reported in only 19 and 22 languages, respectively. It is also worth pointing out that our acoustic analysis of the French nasal vowels [DIAGRAM 5] confirms the findings of earlier research (e.g. Delattre 1965) in that the place of articulation of these vowels varies considerably from that of their (alleged) oral counterparts. While the lip positions for the back and central vowels shared by both languages are identical, the French front rounded vowels /y, œ, ¤ ø, œ/ are not acquired without some difficulty by Arabic speakers (as they are by English speakers, for instance). What does a comparison of the two vowel systems teach us? The French vowels are predominantly high, front, rounded, and extreme Diagram 5. French vowels: acoustic results –200 y

i

u

–300 ø

e

o

–400

–500

✆

F1

‘ɔ ➋ ☞ e

ɔ➋ œ

✆

✆

¤œ

–600

✌‘ɑ

✆

☞‘e a

–700

ɑ ✌

–800 –2500

–2000

–1500 F2

–1000

–500

contrastive analysis of the segments of french & arabic

203

(except when low), with the French /i/ and /i/ being more fronted and closer than the Arabic /i/ and /u/ in the corpus (see Table 9), though it is worth adding that al-Ani (1970) reported values that are almost identical to the French ones.12 The status of the low central vowels /a/ and /ɑ/, however, does merit some attention. While they are pronounced very similar to their Arabic counterparts, one should hasten to add that in contemporary French, the opposition between these two sounds is increasingly receding in favour of a single sound /a/: e.g. théâtre, /teatʁ/. As a result, many French speakers tend to carry this neutralization over into Arabic, with /a/ being produced instead of /ɑ/. There are no diphthongs in French, whereas French speakers have no problems with Arabic ‘diphthongs’ [aw] and [aj]. While the nasal vowels constitute an obstacle for Arabic speakers, French speakers learning Arabic have to be taught to avoid introducing nasalization in what may be called familiar contexts, with /band/, for instance, being realized as /b‘ɑnd/ (cf. French bande, /b‘ɑd/). However, all in all it is safe to say that French-speakers have fewer problems with the vocalic system of Arabic than Arabic-speakers do with that of French. The limited number of contrasts in Arabic and, concomitantly, the wider range of allophonic variation of each phoneme—with variants for /a/, for instance, including [a], [], [ɒ], [] and [ɑ] (cf. Mitchell 1990: 72–89; Anani 1980)—gives rise to problems in both perception and production. 2. Duration In French, duration plays a negligible role in vowel distinction, whereas in Arabic length is phonemic (though not significant in our connected speech sample). In French, there are only two pairs of vowels in which length seems to be distinctive—i.e. [e]–[ε] (e.g. mettre/maître) and [a]–[ɑ] (e.g. patte/pâte)—, but even here it is very unstable (cf. Delattre 1965). In light of this, French speakers often have difficulty in acquiring the appropriate vowel length contrasts in Arabic.

12 It must be added in this respect that al-Ani’s values are based on the realization of the vowels in isolation, i.e. not in word contexts.

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Table 9. Numerical values (Hz) for French and Arabic13 vowels French [i] : [i] : [e] : [ε] : [y] : [ø] : [!] : [a] : [a] : [ɑ] : [ɑ] : [u] : [u] : [o] : [ɔ] : [‘ε] : [‘ɑ] : [‘ɔ] : [◊!] :

F1 : 278 F2 : 2027 F1 : F2 : F1 : 370 F2 : 1920 F1 : 496 F2 : 1823 F1 : 277 F2 : 1735 F1 : 351 F2 : 1423 F1 : 520 F2 : 1349 F1 : 797 F2 : 1370 F1 : F2 : F1 : 685 F2 : 1398 F1 : F2 : F1 : 296 F2 : 725 F1 : F2 : F1 : 397 F2 : 792 F1 : 510 F2 : 1050 F1 : 638 F2 : 1335 F1 : 578 F2 : 850 F1 : 423 F2 : 1488 F1 : 580 F2 : 1208

Arabic (MSA)

Arabic (Qur. recitation)

Arabic (Cairene)

396 1891 298 2213

435 1790 390 1870

400 1575 290 2260

558 1575 597 1473 538 1290 593 1235 395 1010 316 825

615 1460 620 1455 625 1230 640 1175 480 1170 465 1075

740 1540 610 1500 660 1290 500 1245 350 960 290 830

13 The figures for MSA are averages of the values given by Abou Haidar 1994; al-Ani 1970; Ghazeli 1975; Belkaid 1984.

contrastive analysis of the segments of french & arabic

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3. Distribution The frequency of vowel phonemes is as follows:14

Arabic

French

/a/ : 60.9% /i/ : 24.4% /u/ : 14.7%

/e/ /a/ /i/ /ə/ /‘ɑ/ /ε/ /u/ /ɔ/ /y/ /‘ɔ/ /o/ /‘ε/ /!/ /ø/ /◊!/ /ɑ/

: : : : : : : : : : : : : : : :

19.29% 16.69% 12.39% 7.60% 7.59% 6.69% 6.40% 5.05% 4.70% 3.85% 2.60% 2.45% 1.80% 1.70% 1.05% 0.15%

The above table reveals that French is far more of an oral language than is generally thought, with all nasal vowels together only accounting for 14.9% of all French vowels.

V. Conclusion Although further research is required and many areas remain to be explored, our findings reveal a number of points that yield some practical benefits. The acoustic data bring out the differences and similarities between the sounds shared by both languages and their

14 The ranking order for French is that of Delattre 1965: 62, while the Arabic list is based on Ambros 1980 and the findings presented in http://www.itsnet.com/ -qamus/references/arabic_letters.htm. Arabic long vowels were excluded in the absence of a reliable corpus for comparison. It is important to point out that the French percentages are in relation to the total number of vowel phonemes, whereas those for Arabic refer only to the short vowels.

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implications in the learning (and teaching) of the phonemic inventory of the language concerned. Besides providing useful indications as to the order in which the learner should be conditioned to the sounds of the new language, our research sets out a framework within which new sounds can be learned using the native segments as a basis for comparison.

NOTES ON THE CONTRIBUTORS

Soha Abboud-Haggar is assistant professor of Arabic and dialectology, Madrid University, Spain. Adil Elsheikh Abdalla is professor of Arabic, International Islamic University, Malaysia. Mahmoud Abdallah is assistant professor of Arabic, Wayne State University, USA. Sameh Al-Ansary is associate professor of linguistics, Alexandria University, Egypt. Abdellah Chekayri is professor of linguistics, Al Akhawayn University in Efrane, Morocco. Alaa Elgibali is professor of linguistics and TAFL, the American University in Cairo, Egypt. Ali Farghaly is senior program developer at Systran Software Inc., USA. Zeinab Ibrahim is an Arabic language instructor, the American University in Cairo, Egypt. Daniel Newman is professor of linguistics, Haute École de Bruxelles, Institut Supérieur de Traducteurs et Interprètes, Belgium. Jonathan Owens is professor of Arabic and linguistics, Arabic Department, Bayreuth University, Germany. Kees Versteegh is professor of Arabic and Islam, The Middle East Institute, Nijmegen University, Holland.

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INDEX

accusative ending 6–8 acoustic analysis 185 acoustic data 205 acquisition, of language (see also native and first language) 19, 26–28 adequacy, of linguistic analysis 19–24, 50, 95 Al-Andalus, Arabic in 117, 122–123 American learners of Arabic xi, 50, 117, 123–124, 157–172, 180 analogy 66–69, 104, 152–155 analysis, levels of 35, 86–89 apophonic analysis of roots 66, 71–83 approximants 196 Arabic as a foreign language 31, 43, 45, 160–171 Arabic varieties in: Algeria viii, 52–55 Cairo viii, 19, 28, 32, 42–43, 58, 61 Iraq 11, 54 Jordan 26, 52, 54, 57–61, 129 Kuwait 45, 48 Lebanon viii, 52, 55–62, 193 Malaysia 133, 153 Morocco viii, 14–15, 37, 52–64, 78, 117 Sudan 54 Syria viii, 10, 52, 54–63, 125–128 Yemen 52, 54 Basra, school of grammar 107, 109–110, 112 brainstorming, technique of 173, 174 Christian Arabic 12 Classical Arabic 5–17, 22–35, 46–48, 66–77, 82, 103–131, 186, 194–195, 197–198 cognitive process 19, 157–158 computational analysis 33, 45, 48–49, 64, 86, 90 conjunction fa 9 consonant ix, 20–27, 34–36, 47, 65–69, 76–79, 81–83, 104, 127, 185–196, 198 consonant distribution 189, 190

contrastive analysis xii, 144, 185, 192 copular sentences 42 corpus, analysis of ix, 85–86, 95 corpus, compilation of 86 curriculum 47, 107–109, 127 data analysis 33, 66, 119, 124–125 database 85, 185, 198, 202 definite article 92, 134–145, 151–152, 155 definiteness 39, 41–42, 91–92 descriptivism, explicatory 103, 105–106, 109, 116 dialectology of Arabic 117–119, 129, 132 diglossia 29, 31–33, 45–46, 50, 109, 119, 121, 129 education 7, 14, 30, 103–108, 117–118, 132, 171, 180 emphasis viii, 20–26, 32, 46–47, 108, 154, 171–172 emphatics 187, 191, 196 English xi, 4, 35, 44–58, 62–67, 85–90, 122, 134–138, 151–152, 169, 180, 188–189, 191–194, 202 error analysis 7, 133, 136, 144, 150, 154 errors, systematic vii, xi, 3, 7, 17, 122, 133–134, 136–155 etymon 65–66, 69–76, 83 first language (see also acquisition) 26, 134 French xi, 52, 123, 185–205

vii,

gemination 196 gender system 42–43 glides, origin of 66, 76, 80 grammar (see also na w) 11, 13, 17, 19, 22, 29–34, 40–49, 53–56, 66–67, 70, 80, 85–90, 93–98, 104–112, 116, 119–126, 132, 136, 153 grammar, core viii, 29–31, 45, 47, 49 grammar, formalized 89–90 grammar, generative 32, 119

index

222

grammar, inter-Arabic viii, 29–31, 34, 49 grammatical tradition 97, 103, 105, 107–113, 116 historical factors 124 hypercorrection vii, 3–4, 6–8, 10–11, 14, 17, 194 id fa 39, 40–42, 48 im la 13, 121 immigrants, Arab 124 imperfect bi- 16 in-group language 10 interference vii, 3, 7–8, 17, 86–87, 151–152, 155, 161, 195–196 intervocalic 196

pedagogy (see also teaching) 85 pharyngeals xii, 19–22 phonemes, short 20 phonology 19, 20–25, 32, 34, 75, 82–83, 115, 118–127 polysemi viii, 49, 51–54, 62–64, 71 prepositions 8, 40, 89, 131, 152–153 qiy s (see also analogy) 66–69, 104, 152–155 Qur n 11, 30–31, 58, 133–135, 138, 185–186, 194, 198–199 roots, reduplicated 26–27, 61, 65, 70, 75–76 roots, sound 35, 61, 65–66, 70–76 roots, strong 61, 65–66 roots, weak ix, 61, 65–66, 76

Judaeo-Arabic 11–12, 15–16 kaskasa 121 Khoisan 185 Kufan school of grammar 109–110, 112

107,

la n 17, 67, 107, 190 lexemes 51–52 lexicon 70, 75–77, 81–83, 90, 93, 95 linguistic practices 113 marker, linguistic 7, 11–13, 36–37, 44 Middle Arabic vii, 4–5, 10–11, 15–17, 122 mistake (see also errors) 3–7, 8–17, 67, 153 Modern Standard Arabic ix, 30–31, 34–38, 40–48, 55–59, 85–88, 95–98, 154, 191–204 morphology 34–36, 58, 61–75, 82–115, 118–129 na w (see syntax and grammar) 109 nasal vowel xi, 123, 201–205 native language 19–20, 32 negation with lam 7 Neogrammar School 119–122 nonemphatic 23–25 norm, linguistic 6 nouns, diptotic 8 number system 42–43 nunation 8 orthography

22, 108, 162

schema theory 158 semantic broadening 52, 55, 58, 61–62 semantic load 66, 70–75 semantic narrowing 52, 55, 57–60, 62–63 semantic transfer 52, 55–56, 58, 61–63 Semitic 66, 70, 75, 198 semivowels 68, 80, 82, 191, 196 Spain 117 spontaneous speech 86 stability, of language 30, 45, 48–49, 62, 199 statistical analysis 93, 97, 134–137, 144 structuralism 119, 132 syllable structure viii, 20 symmetry 22, 37 syntax 34, 38, 40, 50, 89–91, 95, 118, 127 taltala 121 Tamim 121 teaching, of Arabic 31–33, 45–50, 85–87, 97–98, 103–113, 115–119, 129–131, 153–155, 178, 180–185, 193, 206 think-aloud-technique 157–158, 172, 179 transcription 68–69, 131, 161–162, 180 transfer, metaphorical 52, 55, 57, 59 triliteral (see triradical)

index trills and taps 195 triradical ix, 65–68, 70, 76, 83 typology, of language 19 universals, of language variety, high 29 variety, low 29 velarization 22

19, 27

223

verbal ending 6 verbal report data 157 verbs, defective 57, 61–65, 75–76 vowels, long vii, 20, 25–28, 68, 130, 203 western universities 118 word order 13, 48 written Arabic 133–134, 144

STUDIES IN SEMITIC LANGUAGES AND LINGUISTICS 3. Corré, A.D. The Daughter of My People. Arabic and Hebrew Paraphrases of Jeremiah 8.13-9.23. 1971. ISBN 90 04 02552 9 5. Grand’Henry, J. Les parlers arabes de la région du Mza¯ b (Sahara algérien). 1976. ISBN 90 04 04533 3 6. Bravmann, M.M. Studies in Semitic Philology. 1977. ISBN 90 04 04743 3 8. Fenech, E. Contemporary Journalistic Maltese. An Analytical and Comparative Study. 1978. ISBN 90 04 05756 0 9. Hospers, J.H. (ed.). General Linguistics and the Teaching of Dead HamitoSemitic Languages. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Groningen, 7th8th November 1975, on the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the Institute of Semitic Studies and Near Eastern Archaeology of the State University at Groningen. 1978. ISBN 90 04 05806 0 12. Hoftijzer, J. A Search for Method. A Study in the Syntactic Use of the Hlocale in Classical Hebrew. With the collaboration of H.R. van der Laan and N.P. de Koo. 1981. ISBN 90 04 06257 2 13. Murtonen, A. Hebrew in its West Semitic Setting. A Comparative Survey of Non-Masoretic Hebrew Dialects and Traditions. Part I. A Comparative Lexicon. Section A. Proper Names. 1986. ISBN 90 04 07245 4 Section Ba. Root System: Hebrew Material. 1988. ISBN 90 04 08064 3 Section Bb. Root System: Comparative Material and Discussion. Sections C, D and E: Numerals under 100, Pronouns, Particles. 1989. ISBN 90 04 08899 7 14. Retsö, J. Diathesis in the Semitic Languages. A Comparative Morphological Study. 1989. ISBN 90 04 08818 0 15. Rouchdy, A. Nubians and the Nubian Language in Contemporary Egypt. A Case of Cultural and Linguistic Contact. 1991. ISBN 90 04 09197 1 16. Murtonen, A. Hebrew in its West Semitic Setting. A Comparative Survey of Non-Masoretic Hebrew Dialects and Traditions. Part 2. Phonetics and Phonology. Part 3. Morphosyntactics. 1990. ISBN 90 04 09309 5 17. Jongeling K., H.L. Murre-van den Berg & L. van Rompay (eds.). Studies in Hebrew and Aramaic Syntax. Presented to Professor J. Hoftijzer on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday. 1991. ISBN 90 04 09520 9 18. Cadora, F.J. Bedouin, Village, and Urban Arabic. An Ecolinguistic Study. 1992. ISBN 90 04 09627 2 19. Versteegh, C.H.M. Arabic Grammar and Qur"a¯ nic Exegesis in Early Islam. 1993. ISBN 90 04 09845 3 20. Humbert, G. Les voies de la transmission du Kita¯ b de SÊbawayhi. 1995. ISBN 90 04 09918 2 21. Mifsud, M. Loan Verbs in Maltese. A Descriptive and Comparative Study. 1995. ISBN 90 04 10091 1 22. Joosten, J. The Syriac Language of the Peshitta and Old Syriac Versions of Matthew. Syntactic Structure, Inner-Syriac Developments and Translation Technique. 1996. ISBN 90 04 10036 9 23. Bernards, M. Changing Traditions. Al-Mubarrad’s Refutation of SÊbawayh and the Subsequent Reception of the Kita¯ b. 1997. ISBN 90 04 10595 6

24. Belnap, R.K. and N. Haeri. Structuralist Studies in Arabic Linguistics. Charles A. Ferguson’s Papers, 1954-1994. 1997. ISBN 90 04 10511 5 25. Talmon R. Arabic Grammar in its Formative Age. Kita¯ b al-"Ayn and its Attribution to ]alÊl b. Ah.mad. 1997. ISBN 90 04 10812 2 26. Testen, D.D. Parallels in Semitic Linguistics. The Development of Arabic la- and Related Semitic Particles. 1998. ISBN 90 04 10973 0 27. Bolozky, S. Measuring Productivity in Word Formation. The Case of Israeli Hebrew. 1999. ISBN 90 04 11252 9 28. Ermers, R. Arabic Grammars of Turkic. The Arabic Linguistic Model Applied to Foreign Languages & Translation of #Abu- ayya-n al-#AndalusÊ’s Kita-b al-"Idra-k liLisa-n al-"Atra-k. 1999. ISBN 90 04 113061 29. Rabin, Ch. The Development of the Syntax of Post-Biblical Hebrew. 1999. ISBN 90 04 11433 5 30. Piamenta, M. Jewish Life in Arabic Language and Jerusalem Arabic in Communal Perspective. A Lexical-Semantic Study. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11762 8 31. Kinberg, N. ; Versteegh, K. (ed.). Studies in the Linguistic Structure of Classical Arabic. 2001. ISBN 90 04 11765 2 32. Khan, G. The Early Karaite Tradition of Hebrew Grammatical Thought. Including a Critical Edition, Translation and Analysis of the Diqduq of "Abå Ya#qåb Yåsuf ibn NåÈ on the Hagiographa. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11933 7 33. Zammit, M.R. A Comparative Lexical Study of Qur"§nic Arabic. ISBN 90 04 11801 2 (in preparation) 34. Bachra, B.N. The Phonological Structure of the Verbal Roots in Arabic and Hebrew. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12008 4 35. Åkesson, J. Arabic Morphology and Phonology. Based on the Mar§È al-arw§È by AÈmad b. #AlÊ b. Mas#åd. Presented with an Introduction, Arabic Edition, English Translation and Commentary. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12028 9 36. Khan, G. The Neo-Aramaic Dialect of Qaraqosh. 2002. ISBN 90 04 12863 8 37. Khan, G., Ángeles Gallego, M. and Olszowy-Schlanger, J. The Karaite Tradition of Hebrew Grammatical Thought in its Classical Form. A Critical Edition and English Translation of al-Kit§b al-K§fÊ fÊ al-LuÇa al-#Ibr§niyya by "Abå al-Faraj H§rån ibn al-Faraj. 2 Vols. 2003. ISBN 90 04 13272 4 (Set), ISBN 90 04 13311 9 (Vol. 1), ISBN 90 04 13312 7 (Vol. 2) 38. Haak, M., De Jong, R., Versteegh, K. (eds.). Approaches to Arabic Dialects. A Collection of Articles presented to Manfred Woidich on the Occasion of his Sixtieth Birthday. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13206 6 39. Takács, G. (ed.). Egyptian and Semito-Hamitic (Afro-Asiatic) Studies in Memoriam W. Vycichl. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13245 7 40. Maman, A. Comparative Semitic Philology in the Middle Ages. From Sa#adiah Gaon to Ibn Barån (10th-12th C.). 2004. ISBN 90 04 13620 7 41. Van Peursen, W.Th. The Verbal System in the Hebrew Text of Ben Sira. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13667 3 42. Elgibali, A. Investigating Arabic. Current Parameters in Analysis and Learning. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13792 0 43. Florentin, M. Late Samaritan Hebrew. A Linguistic Analysis of Its Different Types. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13841 2 44. Khan, G. The Jewish Neo-Aramaic Dialect of Sulemaniyya and \alabja. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13869 2